Nebraska Minimum Wage: Rate, Tipped Pay, Youth Wages

A restaurant owner in Grand Island emailed me in late January asking whether she owed back pay. Her payroll was still running at $13.50 an hour, three weeks after the state rate had moved. Nobody had told her, and the poster in her break room was two years out of date.

That is the ordinary failure mode for a small employer. The rate is public and the change is scheduled years ahead, and it still slips past an owner who is doing four jobs at once.

Nebraska has also had a busier year than usual. The legislature rewrote how future increases are calculated, created a youth wage and reset the training wage for younger workers. A Lincoln ordinance was blocked in court the day before it was due to start, and Omaha passed a local minimum wage of its own.

This page covers the wage floor only, with one goal: your payroll moves on the same day the law does. Here you get the rate, the exceptions that genuinely exist, and a short routine for the next time the number moves.

The Current Rate and When It Took Effect

Nebraska's minimum wage is $15.00 per hour, effective January 1, 2026. It runs at that level through December 31, 2026, and it applies to every employer with four or more employees at any one time.

The figure comes from Neb. Rev. Stat. section 48-1203, which lays out a schedule of step increases approved by voters in 2022. The Nebraska Department of Labor announced the change in its notice that Nebraska's minimum wage increases to $15 effective January 1, 2026.

Those voter-approved steps ran $1.50 a year for four straight years, which is why so many payroll systems in the state carried a stale rate at some point along the way.

Coverage turns on headcount. Neb. Rev. Stat. section 48-1202 defines an employer as anyone employing four or more employees at any one time, and it excludes seasonal employment of not more than twenty weeks in a calendar year from that definition.

The headcount test is measured at any one time rather than as an average, so a single busy stretch of non-seasonal hiring can pull a three-person shop across the line.

The Next Scheduled Increase

The next increase is January 1, 2027, and the statute fixes it at 1.75 percent. The method has changed as well: Nebraska now uses a flat annual percentage instead of the cost-of-living formula voters approved in 2022.

Legislative Bill 258, approved by the Governor on February 9, 2026, made the swap. It amended Neb. Rev. Stat. section 48-1203 to raise the minimum wage by one and three-quarters percent on January 1, 2027 and on January 1 of each successive year.

The amended section also sets a deadline for the Nebraska Department of Labor: it must calculate and publish the rate taking effect the following January 1 no later than October 15 of each year, starting October 15, 2026.

The state has already put a number on it. In the Attorney General's June 2026 complaint against the City of Lincoln, the State said the 2027 statewide minimum wage will be $15.26 per hour. Use that for budgeting, then confirm against the department's published figure in October, because the published rate is the one that governs payroll.

Tipped Employees and the Tip Credit

Nebraska allows a tip credit. The cash wage for employees compensated by way of gratuities is $2.13 per hour, which leaves a maximum tip credit of $12.87 against the $15.00 minimum.

Section 48-1203 names waiters, waitresses, hotel bellhops, porters and shoeshine persons as the sort of work it has in mind. Wages plus gratuities must equal or exceed the applicable minimum wage, and the employer covers any shortfall.

The statute also puts the burden of proof on the employer: it is on you, not the worker, to show that someone is in fact compensated by way of gratuities. Read that as a quiet instruction to keep clean tip records rather than assume the category applies.

Because the $2.13 figure is fixed, every increase in the state minimum widens the credit instead of the cash wage. When the rate moves to the 2027 figure, the cash wage stays at $2.13 and the tip credit grows.

City and County Rates

Two Nebraska cities have adopted their own minimum wage, Lincoln and Omaha, and the Attorney General has sued both. A court has blocked Lincoln's ordinance, Omaha's is due to start on October 1, 2026 while the challenge runs, and everywhere else the $15.00 state rate is the only floor.

Lincoln moved first. The Lincoln City Council passed a Lincoln Minimum Wage Ordinance on May 11, 2026, as Chapter 9.80 of the municipal code, and the mayor approved it on May 15. Set to take effect on July 18, 2026, the ordinance requires $15.00 per hour for every employee regardless of age through December 31, 2026.

For later years, the Lincoln ordinance indexes the rate to the Consumer Price Index for all urban consumers for the Midwest Region, a regional measure of inflation, measured August to August, with each increase rounded up to the nearest five cents. On the August 2026 index that gives $15.55 for 2027, against $15.26 statewide. Violations carry misdemeanor fines of up to $500 under the ordinance, and each day of violation counts as a separate offense.

The Nebraska Attorney General sued the city on June 18, 2026, arguing that the minimum wage is a matter of statewide concern and that the ordinance conflicted with state law on both the growth rate and the youth wage. On July 17, 2026, the Lancaster County District Court enjoined Lincoln from enforcing the ordinance until further order of the court. The injunction is not a final ruling on the merits, so the case continues.

Omaha followed. The Omaha City Council passed Ordinance No. 44716 on July 14, 2026, and the mayor signed it on July 21. It sets $15.00 per hour for each employee working within city limits, with no exception for age, and from January 1, 2027 raises the rate each year by the same Midwest consumer price index.

The Omaha ordinance is due to take effect on October 1, 2026, and the Attorney General sued in Douglas County District Court on August 18, 2026 to block it.

If you employ people in Lincoln, pay the state rate and keep an eye on the court case. In Omaha, check the Douglas County court's latest order before you pay anyone the $13.50 youth wage. For 2026 both city ordinances match the state's $15.00; the differences are that both drop the youth wage, and from 2027 both set the January raise by inflation instead of 1.75 percent.

Youth, Training and Student Wages

Nebraska has three sub-minimum tiers. A youth minimum wage and a training wage both sit at $13.50 per hour, and student-learners in a vocational program get at least 75 percent of the otherwise applicable minimum. LB 258 created the youth wage and replaced the old training rate (75 percent of the federal minimum) with the flat $13.50.

The youth minimum wage covers employees who are at least fourteen and younger than sixteen and who are not emancipated minors. It has no time limit and no volume cap, and it rises by 1.5 percent on January 1, 2030 and on January 1 of every fifth year after that.

The training wage is the tighter of the two. Under Neb. Rev. Stat. section 48-1203.01 it applies to a new employee who is at least sixteen and younger than twenty, for ninety days from the date of hire. Seasonal and migrant workers and emancipated minors do not qualify.

The training wage can run for a second ninety-day period only when the on-the-job training requires technical, personal or other necessary skills and the Commissioner of Labor has approved it. This rate rises 1.5 percent every January 1 starting in 2027.

Industry Carve-Outs and Exclusions

Nebraska has no industry-specific minimum wage. There is no fast food rate, no healthcare rate and no hospitality rate, so a quick-service operator and a machine shop work from the same $15.00 figure.

What Nebraska has instead is a list of exclusions in section 48-1202. Agriculture is the big one: any individual employed in agriculture is outside the definition of employee, so the state rate does not apply to farm labor at all.

The same statute also excludes babysitters in or about a private home, as well as bona fide executive, administrative and professional employees and superintendents or supervisors. The section also addresses a disabled person who receives public aid and works in a program of rehabilitation: that person is paid at a wage consistent with their health, efficiency and general well-being.

Read those exclusions against federal law before you act on one. A Nebraska farm outside the state act may still be covered by the federal Fair Labor Standards Act at $7.25 per hour, subject to its own agricultural tests.

The best known of those federal tests is the small-farm exemption in 29 U.S.C. 213(a)(6). An employer that used no more than 500 man-days of farm labor in every calendar quarter of the preceding year is outside the federal minimum wage too, which leaves its farm workers with no wage floor from either law.

The Poster Requirement

Every covered Nebraska employer must post a summary of the state wage and hour law where employees can see it. Neb. Rev. Stat. section 48-1205 requires that summary, covering sections 48-1201 to 48-1209, to stay posted in a conspicuous place on or about the premises. The Commissioner of Labor furnishes it without charge.

The current poster is a free download from the Nebraska Department of Labor required posters page. It carries the rate on its face, which is exactly why it becomes evidence against you the moment the rate changes and the sheet on the wall does not.

Two habits keep this clean. Print the replacement in December so it goes up with the January rate rather than a month later. And for people who never walk into a building, send the same notice by email and keep the send record, because a conspicuous place on the premises does not do much for a fully remote payroll clerk.

How Nebraska Compares to the Federal Rate

The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour and has not moved since July 24, 2009. Nebraska's $15.00 is more than double that. The higher of the two rates applies, so for covered Nebraska employers the state rate is the only one that matters in practice.

The federal floor still does real work in two Nebraska situations. A business with fewer than four employees sits outside the state act but is usually covered federally, and an agricultural employer excluded from the state act may be federally covered as well. In both cases $7.25 is the number, not zero.

What to Do When the Rate Rises

Treat a rate change as a short checklist rather than a single payroll edit. The rate itself is the easy part; the tiers, the salaried staff and the poster are where small employers get caught.

Everything above is a recurring calendar item, not a one-time project. Put the October publication date and the December poster swap on your calendar now, and each January change becomes routine instead of a scramble.

This is also the sort of thing FirstHR exists to hold for you. It is an onboarding and HR platform rather than a payroll provider, so it does not run the wage calculation. It keeps the offer letters, rate acknowledgments and posted notices in one place, so a rate change becomes a task with a due date.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the minimum wage in Nebraska?

Nebraska's minimum wage is $15.00 per hour, effective January 1, 2026 and running through December 31, 2026. It applies to employers with four or more employees at any one time. Lincoln and Omaha have adopted local ordinances at the same $15.00 for 2026; Lincoln's is enjoined, and Omaha's, due October 1, 2026, is being challenged in court.

Does Nebraska allow a tip credit?

Yes. The cash wage for employees compensated by way of gratuities is $2.13 per hour, giving a maximum tip credit of $12.87. Wages plus tips must reach $15.00 per hour, and the employer owes the difference when they do not. The burden of proving that someone is a tipped employee sits with the employer.

Do small employers have to pay the Nebraska minimum wage?

Only those with four or more employees at any one time. Seasonal employment of twenty weeks or less in a calendar year does not count toward that threshold. Smaller employers usually remain covered by the federal Fair Labor Standards Act at $7.25 per hour.

Can I pay a teenager less than $15.00 in Nebraska?

Yes, in two defined cases. Employees aged fourteen and fifteen may be paid a $13.50 youth minimum wage, and new hires aged sixteen to nineteen may be paid a $13.50 training wage for ninety days, extendable once only through an approved on-the-job training program. No more than a quarter of your total paid hours may sit at the training wage.

Does Lincoln have its own minimum wage?

Not an enforceable one. Lincoln adopted an ordinance due to start on July 18, 2026, and the Lancaster County District Court enjoined the city from enforcing it on July 17, 2026, after the Attorney General sued. Lincoln employers pay the state rate while the injunction stands.

When does the Nebraska minimum wage go up again?

On January 1, 2027, by a fixed 1.75 percent. The State put the resulting rate at $15.26 per hour in its court filing against Lincoln, and the Nebraska Department of Labor must publish the official rate no later than October 15 of the preceding year.

Are farm workers covered by the Nebraska minimum wage?

No. Individuals employed in agriculture are excluded from the state definition of employee, so the $15.00 rate does not apply to them. Federal law may still cover the same workers at $7.25 per hour, subject to its own agricultural exemptions.