The 2026 temporary disability rates — and which year's rate you get

For injuries in 2026, temporary disability pays two-thirds of your average weekly wage, floored at $264.61 and capped at $1,764.11 a week — set by DWC from the state average weekly wage (DWC Newsline 2025-116). The numbers are the easy part. The rule about which year's numbers apply to you is where money is routinely lost.

The rule: date of injury, for life

Your rate is set by your date of injury and does not change for the life of the claim, no matter when the payment is made. A 2023 injury paid in 2026 still pays at 2023's limits. This is the single most common error on rate pages — and it cuts both ways: workers expect raises that never come, and carriers occasionally apply a newer minimum where an older one governs. Every year's limits, with the Newsline that set each.

The exception: § 4661.5, the raise nobody claims

When a temporary total disability payment is made two or more years after the date of injury, it is computed at the limits in effect on the date of payment — not the date of injury. Labor Code § 4661.5. On a delayed or denied-then-accepted claim at the cap, that difference can run to tens of thousands of dollars.

It is self-executing. Nobody has to ask. And carriers routinely keep paying at the old rate anyway — which makes the back-pay check on a formerly denied claim the first place to audit. How temporary disability works, in full.