BidtallyE-rate Category 2 budget: how it is calculated (FY2026–FY2030)
Short answer. For FY2026–FY2030 USAC sets a pre-discount Category 2 budget of $201.57 per full-time student for schools and $5.43 per square foot for libraries, with a floor of $30,175 per school or library ($66,385 for Tribal libraries). The budget is for the five-year cycle, belongs to the school district, library system, independent school or independent library, and what has been funded in the cycle comes off it.
1. The official method
- Five-year cycle. Each eligible school, district, library or library system may receive a budgeted amount of pre-discount Category 2 support over a five-year cycle that reset in FY2026, less the pre-discount amount of Category 2 support received earlier in the cycle (47 CFR 54.502(d)(1)).
- The multipliers. The rule text gives base amounts of $167 per student and $4.50 per library square foot and has the Wireline Competition Bureau adjust them for inflation (54.502(d)(2)-(5)). The USAC Category Two budget page gives the figures for FY2026–FY2030: $201.57 per full-time student (part-time students are not counted) and $5.43 per square foot for all floors of each library outlet, including areas closed to the public.
- The floor. $30,175 for every school and library, and $66,385 for Tribal libraries, which applies when the calculated amount is lower (USAC; 54.502(d)(4)).
- Whose budget. A budget belongs to a budgeted entity: an independent school, independent library, school district or library system. Districts and library systems are calculated at district or system level and may allocate the money among their eligible sites. With more than 10 schools or branches you multiply the total students or square feet by the multiplier, unless the number of sites times $30,175 is higher; with 10 or fewer you calculate each site, apply the floor where it is higher, and add them up. USAC's example: schools of 50, 100 and 200 students give $30,175 + $30,175 + $40,314 = $100,664.
- Pre-discount. The budget counts the pre-discount price. You confirm student counts or square footage in the first year you apply for Category 2 support in the cycle; replacement budgets for changed counts are possible from FY2027 (USAC).
- Look it up. USAC's E-Rate C2 Budget Tool shows a forecast from your profile, a preliminary figure after your first certified Form 471, and a confirmed figure after funding decisions.
- Buildings. Category 2 support is not available for non-instructional school buildings or separate library administrative buildings, except as 54.502(d)(6) allows.
2. Where doing it by hand stops
The multiplication is easy. By hand it stops where your own records start: one line per school or branch with the right student or square-foot count, the floor applied to the small ones, the 10-site rule for large districts, and then what is already funded or pending against each budget, compared with the pre-discount total of the Category 2 requests you are about to make. When the bids change, the totals change, and the comparison has to be redone.
Bidtally keeps that list: you give each site's students or square feet, the funded and pending amounts, and it computes each site's FY2026–FY2030 budget with the floor, the amount still available, and flags a Category 2 request larger than the available budget. It calculates the budget site by site with the floor applied to each; for a district with more than 10 schools USAC's district-level rule can give a different total, and it does not read the USAC C2 Budget Tool, so confirm the figure there before you file. It does not file the Form 471.
Questions this page answers
What is the E-rate Category 2 budget per student for FY2026–FY2030?
USAC gives $201.57 per full-time student, with a floor of $30,175 per school or library. Libraries get $5.43 per square foot. Tribal libraries have a $66,385 floor.
Is the Category 2 budget before or after the discount?
Before. It is a pre-discount amount, so what you request counts at its pre-discount price against the budget.
How is the budget calculated for a school district?
At district level. With more than 10 schools, total students times the multiplier, unless the number of schools times the $30,175 floor is higher. With 10 or fewer, each school separately with the floor, then added up (USAC).
Where do I find my remaining Category 2 budget?
In USAC's E-Rate C2 Budget Tool, which shows forecast, preliminary and confirmed figures.
3. Check it on a sample, free
Open the sample and see a district's school-by-school Category 2 budgets, the amount still available and the over-budget check, with no sign-up. Open the free sample