How Long to Keep Pay Stubs: Employees and Employers

Employers generally keep payroll records for at least three years under FLSA rules and employment tax records for at least four under IRS guidance, longer where a state requires it, such as New York's six years. Employees usually keep stubs until their Form W-2 matches, then keep the W-2 with their tax records.

Those two answers reflect two different jobs. An employer holds records because federal and state rules require them and because wage questions can come up years later. An employee holds stubs mainly to check year-end forms and to support a tax return. The sections below take each in turn, with the source for every period, and then cover when copies can safely go. For the wider system of folders, file names and access, see the paystub recordkeeping guide.

Retention periods for employers, record by record

Federal wage law has no pay stub requirement, according to the Department of Labor, so no federal rule says "keep stubs for X years". What the rules do cover is the payroll information a stub is built from, and a stub copy is often the most convenient place that information lives. Here is how the periods line up by type of record.

The practical reading is that a small employer rarely gets away with less than four years for anything tied to wages and withholding, and a business with staff in a state like New York is looking at six.

Why the retention clock starts at different moments

The periods above do not all count from the same event, which is why "keep it three years" can be wrong even when three years is the correct number.

• The FLSA regulation at 29 CFR 516.5 counts payroll records from the last date of entry.
• The IRS counts employment tax records from the date the tax becomes due or is paid, whichever is later.
• New York Labor Law 195(4) requires payroll records to be preserved for not less than six years.

Illustrative example (made-up figures): A New York employer issues a stub with a December 15, 2026 pay date, and the payroll record for that period gets its last entry the same day. Counting three years from that entry gives December 15, 2029 for the FLSA period. Assume the last employment tax connected to those December wages was due or paid on January 31, 2027; four years later is January 31, 2031. The New York six-year period runs to about December 2032. The latest of the three dates, December 2032, is the one that governs when the business can consider disposal. These dates are assumptions to show the method, not a determination for any real employer.

What employees should keep, and for how long

Individuals are not bound by payroll retention rules, but the IRS publishes guidance on how long to keep records that support a tax return. Its "How long should I keep records?" page, last updated June 30, 2026, lists these periods:

• 3 years, in the ordinary case.
• 6 years if you do not report income you should report and it is more than 25% of the gross income shown on your return.
• 7 years if you file a claim for a loss from worthless securities or a bad debt deduction.
• Indefinitely if you do not file a return or file a fraudulent return.

For most employees, paystubs are working papers for one question: does the Form W-2 match what I was paid? Once that is settled, the final stub of the year is the one worth keeping with the W-2 and the return. Earlier stubs can be kept for the same period for simplicity, or thinned out once the W-2 checks out, unless something unusual happened during the year.

Illustrative example (made-up figures): An employee's final 2026 stub shows year-to-date gross pay of $61,200, while Box 1 of the W-2 shows $55,700. The $5,500 gap looks alarming until the stub's year-to-date deductions are checked: $4,300 of traditional 401(k) contributions and $1,200 of pre-tax health premiums. In this made-up case both are excluded from Box 1, and $4,300 + $1,200 = $5,500, so the figures reconcile. The employee keeps the final stub with the W-2, because it is the document that explains the difference.

Job changes make this harder, because two or more employers' stubs have to add up across two or more W-2s. The walkthrough on reviewing YTD totals after changing jobs covers that case.

Paper stubs, PDFs and payroll portal access

The format of a record matters less than whether it can be read later. On the employer side, 29 CFR 516.1 prescribes no particular form of records and allows them to be kept on microfilm or in data processing storage, as long as copies are clear and identifiable by date or pay period. A consistently named PDF archive meets that description better than a box of faded thermal printouts.

Employees face a different risk: losing access. Many employers deliver stubs through an online portal, and access can end soon after a job does. Download every stub, or at least the final one of each year, before your last day.

If a stub is gone, some states give current and former employees a way to request copies. California Labor Code 226(b) gives them the right to inspect or receive a copy of their employment records on reasonable request, and it gives the employer 21 calendar days to comply.

When stub copies can be destroyed

Reaching the end of a retention period means a record may be disposed of, not that it must be. Before deleting or shredding a batch, run through these checks:

1. Identify the longest period that applies across federal and state rules for every location involved.
2. Confirm the date that period counts from for this batch of records.
3. Check for anything that should pause disposal: an open wage claim, an audit, a pending correction or a dispute with a former employee.
4. Make sure the batch does not include records from a later year that were filed in the wrong folder.
5. Dispose of paper by shredding and delete electronic copies from backups as well as the main folder.
6. Log what was destroyed, the date range, the method and who approved it.

Corrected stubs follow the same periods as originals, and the original should not be destroyed early just because a replacement exists. The article on documenting a paystub correction explains how to keep the two together.

Old stubs after a payroll switch, a sale or a closure

Retention periods assume the records are still reachable. Three business changes regularly break that assumption, and each calls for a specific step before access disappears.

• Changing payroll providers. Before the old contract ends, export every stub PDF, the payroll registers, filed tax returns and deposit confirmations, then open a sample of each to confirm the export is readable. Access to a closed account can end without much notice.
• Selling the business. Decide in writing who keeps the payroll history for the years still inside their retention periods, and how former employees can request copies afterward.
• Closing the business. Retention obligations do not stop because payroll did. Name a person, often the former owner or the outside accountant, who holds the archive and answers requests until the last review date passes.

Employees can protect themselves too. When a job ends, or when an employer announces a payroll change, download the stubs you might need and the final stub for each year into your own files.

Situations that justify keeping records longer

Some circumstances make it sensible to hold records past the minimum even when no rule requires it:

• A wage-and-hour complaint, lawsuit or agency inquiry is open or likely.
• An amended tax return or a corrected W-2 is in progress.
• The business is being sold, merged or closed, and a buyer or successor may need payroll history.
• An employee's pay involved something unusual, such as back pay, a retroactive raise or a garnishment.
• Records from one year explain balances that carry into later years, such as year-to-date totals after a mid-year payroll switch.

Owners who issue stubs themselves can make retention simpler by producing them consistently from the start; the article on paycheck stubs for small business owners covers the fields, and PayStubGo paycheck stubs come out as PDFs you save into your own archive.

Retention requirements are set separately by the IRS, the Department of Labor and each state's labor and revenue agencies, and states differ widely, so check the agencies for every state where you have employees. This guide summarizes published periods and is not legal or tax advice; an attorney or tax professional can confirm what applies to your records.