You run a limited company, work hard, and money comes in. But when you want to get it out you face the question every AB owner wrestles with: salary or dividend? The answer is not one or the other but a combination. Boring truth, but the real question is how much of each. And that answer affects your pension, your safety net when you are ill, and your tax bill in ways that cost many AB owners hundreds of thousands of kronor over a career.
Set your salary at the pension ceiling, around 56,000 kr per month, add pension contributions as a company expense, and take the rest as dividend within your gränsbelopp. On a typical consulting profit you do not even lose take-home compared with zero salary, because dividend above your gränsbelopp is taxed as salary anyway. And you build pension, protect your SGI (sick-pay base income) and keep your insurance rights. That is a trade most AB owners should make.
I walk through the tax cost of each route, what salary gives you that dividends cannot, how the payroll-based allowance rules affect your dividend capacity, and a concrete worked example with three scenarios. Run your own salary in the net salary calculator and your dividend in the 3:12 calculator.
The money is in the company
When your AB invoices and the money lands in the company account, it is not yours yet. To get it out privately you have two legal routes: salary or dividend. Salary is an operating cost for the company, tax-deductible, and taxed for you as earned income, around 30 to 50 percent depending on municipal tax rate and whether you cross the state-tax breakpoint. Dividend is paid from the company's profit after corporate tax (20.6 percent) and taxed for you at the low rate of 20 percent within the gränsbelopp. Dividend above the gränsbelopp is taxed as employment income, just like salary, up to a very high ceiling of 90 income base amounts (IBB); only beyond that does 30 percent capital tax apply. This is not a one-time decision but an annual policy you and your accountant should review each autumn.
Dividend: the cheap route
On paper dividend looks cheaper. The company pays 20.6 percent corporate tax on profit, and you then pay 20 percent on the dividend within the gränsbelopp. Effective tax on 100 kronors profit: the company keeps 79.40 kr, you keep 63.52 kr of that, so around 36.5 percent total tax. Compare that with salary at a 50 percent marginal rate where you get 50 kr out of 100 kr gross (and the company also pays 31.42 percent employer contributions on top). Dividend wins on tax kronor. But that is not the full picture, and that is where many AB owners go wrong. The gränsbelopp is not unlimited, and the complex 3:12 rules cap how much low-taxed dividend you can take out each year. Above that cap the dividend is taxed as earned income, and the advantage disappears.
What salary gives you
Salary is not just a tax cost. It is the foundation for your entire social insurance system. Your sick-pay base income (SGI) is built on your salary: no salary, no meaningful sick pay, no parental benefit worth speaking of, and unemployment insurance is also calculated from salary. Your state pension accrues at 18.5 percent of your pensionable income (PGI), which is built on salary up to the income ceiling. An AB owner who takes zero salary for ten years and only takes dividends misses the pension that would have been built on 56,000 kr per month. Over ten years that is 6.7 million kr of pensionable income that never generates any state pension. Salary is also deductible for the company: every krona you take as salary reduces the company's taxable profit, which is good if you would otherwise leave the money sitting and pay corporate tax on it.
The worked example: consultant with 1.2 million
Say you are an IT consultant and the company invoices 1,200,000 kr per year, net after VAT. The company has no other costs. Here are three withdrawal strategies and what they give in net monthly income (approximate, at an average municipal tax rate, not counting company pension separately):
Scenario A, zero salary: The company pays 20.6 percent corporate tax on the whole profit: 1,200,000 x 0.794 = 952,800 kr remaining. With no salaries your gränsbelopp is just the basic amount, 322 400 kr, so only that much is taxed at 20 percent. The other 630,400 kr is taxed as employment income, around 197,000 kr in tax with no job tax credit. Net around 691,000 kr, that is about 57,600 kr per month. No pension, no SGI, no insurance rights.
Scenario B, salary at the pension ceiling 56,000 kr/month: The company pays 56,000 x 12 = 672,000 kr in salary plus employer contributions at 31.42 percent, totalling around 883,000 kr for the salary cost. The remaining profit of around 317,000 kr is taxed at the corporate rate, leaving about 252,000 kr to take as dividend, well within a gränsbelopp of about 336,000 kr. You as employee receive 56,000 kr gross and pay around 13,500 kr in tax, netting about 42,500 kr, plus dividend net of around 201,000 kr / 12 = 16,800 kr per month. Total around 59,300 kr per month, with full pension and SGI.
Scenario C, high salary 80,000 kr/month: The company cannot even afford it: 80,000 kr a month plus employer contributions costs about 1,262,000 kr a year, more than the whole profit. The most it can pay is about 76,000 kr a month, which nets around 52,000 kr, with nothing left for dividend. The salary above the pension ceiling brings no extra pension, just a marginal rate above the state-tax breakpoint.
Under the 2026 rules Scenario B beats Scenario A even on take-home, by around 1,700 kr a month, because a zero salary only buys you the basic amount at 20 percent and the rest is taxed like salary anyway. On top of that, Scenario B builds pension year after year. Ten years of Scenario B versus Scenario A means 6.7 million kr of pensionable income and half a million more in occupational pension if the company also contributes to occupational pension (tjänstepension). Calculate your own dividend allowance in the 3:12 calculator.
Payroll-based allowance
Here is something most AB owners do not know: how much salary you take out affects how much low-taxed dividend allowance you get next year. Under the 3:12 rules you may use a payroll-based allowance of 50 percent of the company's total salaries above a threshold (the löneavdrag). For 2026 the löneavdrag is 644 800 kr; salaries above that level count at 50 percent in your gränsbelopp. In a sole-owner AB the salaries are essentially just your own, so taking more salary gives you more low-taxed dividend capacity next year. It is a multi-year game: build gränsbelopp headroom now so you can take more tax-efficient dividends as the company grows. This is the strongest argument for taking a sensible salary even when you do not need the cash right now.
The pension gap
This is the trap I see most often. The AB owner takes high dividends for 15 years, lives well, and realises in their fifties that there is no pension to speak of. The state pension is minimal because no salaries were ever registered. There is no occupational pension because the company never contributed. That is a disaster, and it is entirely preventable. The AB owner must design their own pension. You do that two ways: take enough salary to accrue state pension, and let the company contribute to your occupational pension (tjänstepension) as a deductible expense. The company may set aside up to 35 percent of your salary as a pension contribution that counts as an operating cost. On 56,000 kr per month that is 19,600 kr per month, 235,200 kr per year, that leaves the company's taxable profit and goes into your pension. Most accountants say it: take at least 50,000 kr per month in salary. That advice is worth heeding.
My rule of thumb
Salary at the pension ceiling, around 56,000 kr per month, gives you full state pension, full SGI and the right to use maximum payroll-based allowance. Let the company set aside 25 to 35 percent of salary as occupational pension. Then take the rest of the profit as dividend within the gränsbelopp. If profit exceeds what you can take out at low tax, leave the money in the company and build gränsbelopp headroom for next year. Two things you should never do: take zero salary in the belief that dividend is always better, and leave money sitting without a plan. Both have real costs, but the pension gap is the largest and hardest to recover from.