Arizona Child Support Calculator

It depends on both parents’ income before taxes, the number of children, and how many days the children spend with each parent. For example, if you earn $4,333 a month, the other parent earns $3,000, and the children spend 4 nights a month with you, you would pay about $568 a month for one child or $849 for two.

Four nights a month is about 49 days a year, which earns the paying parent a small parenting time credit. A paying parent who earns $2,100.80 a month or less (about $485 a week) pays nothing in this table, and one who earns a little more pays only part of the amount, because of Arizona’s low-income limit. Support is 10% higher for children 12 and older. Arizona’s schedule of support for both parents together is in the Arizona Child Support Guidelines.

Arizona uses an income shares formula, which means both parents’ incomes count. It adds both parents’ monthly incomes before taxes, looks up the schedule amount for that total, and divides it by each parent’s share of the income. The parent with less parenting time then gets a credit that lowers what they pay, based on the days they have the children.

The steps are in Sections II to VIII of the guidelines:

1. Find each parent’s Child Support Income, Arizona’s name for gross income from all sources, before taxes.
2. Subtract spousal maintenance (alimony) paid, support paid for other children, and an allowance for other children living with the parent.
3. Look up the schedule amount for the combined income, at the nearest $50 row, and add 10% for children 12 or older (prorated when only some are).
4. Add the children’s insurance, child care, and any school or special-needs costs, then split the total by income share.
5. Subtract the parenting-time credit from the share of the parent with less time.
6. Credit the paying parent for costs they pay directly, then apply the low-income limit.

Example

One parent earns $5,000 a month and the other $3,000, so their combined income is $8,000. The schedule amount for two children under 12 is $1,622. The higher earner has 62.5% of the income, so with no parenting time they pay about $1,014 a month. With 52 days a year (every other weekend), the 7.5% credit brings it to about $892.

Yes, and it starts well short of 50/50. The parent with less time gets a credit that starts at 20 days a year and grows to half of basic support at 164 days. With two children and gross incomes of $5,000 and $3,000 a month, the higher earner pays about $1,014 a month with under 20 days, $892 at 52 days (every other weekend), $730 at 100 days, $487 at 146 days, and $203 from 164 days through 50/50.

The credit starts at 2.5% of basic support at 20 days a year and rises in steps. Arizona counts time in days: each 24 hours is a day, a block of 12 hours or more counts as a day, 6 to 11 hours as half a day, and 3 to 5 hours as a quarter day. The calculator above counts overnights instead.

At equal time, the higher earner still pays when incomes differ. In the example, their 62.5% share is $1,014, and their credit is half the schedule amount ($811). The parenting time table is in Section V of the guidelines.

Child care a parent pays so they can work or look for work can be added to basic support and split by income share. The parent who pays the provider gets credit for it.

For example, if child care costs $600 a month and you have two thirds of the combined income, your share is $400. Costs that change during the year, like summer care, are averaged into one monthly amount. See Section III.B.4 of the guidelines.

Every Arizona order names a parent to provide the children’s health insurance. The children’s share of the premium is added to basic support and split by income share, and the order sets the percentage each parent pays of medical bills insurance doesn’t cover.

• Reasonable cost: no more than 5% of the providing parent’s gross income, and the plan must work where the children live, under A.R.S. § 25-320.
• Who provides it: if both parents can get comparable coverage, the parent with more parenting time does, unless they agree otherwise.
• Uncovered bills: ask the other parent within 180 days of the bill; they have 45 days to pay their share.

See Sections III.B.3 and X.C of the guidelines.

If you get Cash Assistance, the support collected while you get it repays the state, and none of it comes to you. You also have to help the state get support from the other parent. Nutrition Assistance (food stamps, or SNAP) doesn’t require this.

• Cash Assistance: while you get it, the state has the right to collect your support, under A.R.S. § 46-407. You have to help it set up and collect support (for example, by naming the other parent), unless you have a good reason not to, such as a risk of violence, under 42 U.S.C. § 608(a)(2).
• What your family keeps: none of the support collected while you get Cash Assistance, as DCSS explains.
• Nutrition Assistance: Arizona doesn’t require you to help with child support, according to the USDA SNAP State Options Report.

Cash Assistance, Nutrition Assistance, and SSI don’t count as income in the formula, under Section II of the guidelines.

The paying parent keeps $2,100.80 a month to live on in 2026 (80% of full-time pay at Arizona’s $15.15 minimum wage). A judge can lower support to what they earn above that amount, or to $0. The judge looks at the other household’s finances before deciding. On January 1, 2027, the minimum wage rises to $15.65, so this amount rises to about $2,170 a month.

• Example: a paying parent earning $2,300 a month has $199 above $2,100.80, so with the other parent earning $4,000 and one child, support is limited to about $199 a month.
• Earning less than $2,100.80: the court can order no support or a small amount.
• Under $8: no support is ordered when it would be less than $8 a month, the state’s monthly processing fee.
• Earning less by choice: a judge presumes a parent can work full time at least at minimum wage, under A.R.S. § 25-320(N).

See Sections VIII and X.A of the guidelines.

Arizona’s schedule ends at $30,000 a month in combined income. Above that, the $30,000 amount applies unless a parent asks for more and shows the children need it.

At $30,000 combined, the schedule is $2,572 a month for one child and $3,911 for two. For more than six children, the six-child amount applies unless a parent shows the children need more. See Section III.A.1 of the guidelines.

Yes. A judge must order a different amount when the formula amount would be unfair or wrong for the family, considering what is best for the children. The order must show the formula amount and the new amount.

Examples in the guidelines include a big income gap when both parents have a lot of parenting time, one parent paying a much larger share of the children’s costs, and high travel costs for parenting time. Parents can also agree in writing to a different amount if they know the formula amount. See Section IX of the guidelines.

Ask the Division of Child Support Services (DCSS) to review your order, or file a petition to modify it in court. You need a big, lasting change, and a new amount 15% or more different is evidence of one. The current order stays in effect until it changes.

• Through DCSS: if DCSS handles your case, ask for a review. Either parent can ask every three years without showing a change, under A.R.S. § 25-503.
• Through the court: the simplified process uses the Supreme Court’s Petition to Modify (Change) Child Support (Simplified Process) and related forms when the new amount differs by 15% or more.

The rules are in Section XIV of the guidelines. The Arizona child support guide walks through each step.

Yes. The Arizona Child Support Calculator, published by the Superior Court in Maricopa County, is used statewide and produces the Child Support Worksheet courts use.

The Arizona Child Support Calculator takes the details this page leaves out, like children’s ages, partial parenting-time days, other children, and added costs. It uses the 2022 guidelines, which apply until Arizona finishes the review it has underway.