PhD salary in Germany according to TVöD I have a PhD acceptance letter from an institute in Germany. They have written that my salary would be according to TVöD (collective salary scheme for the German public service).

I searched about that, but there are different ideas.
The following answer applies to all public-service salary schemes (TVöD, TV-L, TV-H, etc.) that apply to PhD students. The information that is most likely missing is:


Your class (Entgeltgruppe): PhD students typically paid according to class 13, which is the lowest class for people with a master’s degree or equivalent. As even postdoc positions with class 14 are extremely rare, it’s safe to assume that this is your class if no further information is given.
Your level (Stufe): Unless you worked in German public service on this level before, you will have the following progression of levels:


first year: Level 1
second and third year: Level 2
fourth to sixth year: Level 3
after that, you hopefully finished your PhD



Now, the offer will have to state how much you are officially working. It’s usually somewhere between 50 % and 75 %, but may also be 100 % – this mostly depends on your field.
This should give you all you need to obtain your gross salary (brutto) from the tables or calculators.

Keep in mind that taxes and insurance will be deduced from this, which depends on several aspects such as whether you are married, have children, whether you will use the German retirement provision (VBL) etc. However, a considerable portion of the taxes will actually be to your direct benefit (health insurance, retirement provision, etc.) and things that you would pay with your salary in many other countries.