Retirement Savings Calculator

Enter the amount you contribute each year and the return you expect. The calculator builds the balance year by year, showing the opening balance, the contribution, the growth and the closing balance for each year.

How to use the retirement savings calculator

1. Yearly deposit: the total you put into the account each year, including any employer match. If you contribute $400 a month and your employer adds $100, enter $6,000.
2. Interest rate: the average yearly return you want to plan with, after fees. The default is 7%.
3. Period: the number of years until you plan to stop contributing, up to 50.

The result shows the balance at the end of the period, the total you deposited and the growth. The table lists every year: the opening balance, the deposit, the growth for that year and the closing balance.

How the calculation works

Each year, the calculator adds your deposit at the start of the year and then grows the whole balance by the rate. The next year starts from that closing balance. It is the same as compound interest on a growing pile of money:

Closing balance = (opening balance + deposit) × (1 + rate)

With the defaults, $6,000 a year at 7% for 15 years:

• Year 1: $6,000 in, $420 of growth, $6,420 at the end.
• Year 2: $6,420 + $6,000 in, $869 of growth, about $13,289 at the end.
• Year 15: the balance reaches about $161,328, of which $90,000 is your deposits and about $71,328 is growth.

The yearly growth figure keeps rising because each year’s growth is calculated on a bigger balance. Late in a long period, a single year’s growth can be larger than your deposit.

Why starting early matters so much

Here is the same $6,000 a year at 7%, for different lengths of time:

Years	Total deposited	Balance at the end	Growth
15	$90,000	$161,328	$71,328
20	$120,000	$263,191	$143,191
30	$180,000	$606,438	$426,438
40	$240,000	$1,281,657	$1,041,657

Going from 30 to 40 years adds $60,000 of deposits and about $675,000 to the balance. Someone who starts at 25 and contributes $6,000 a year until 65 ends up with about twice as much as someone who starts at 35, even though the late starter only puts in a quarter less.

Put another way, to reach $1 million at 7%, you would need to save about $4,700 a year over 40 years, about $9,900 a year over 30 years, or about $22,800 a year over 20 years.

Choosing a rate

The rate is an assumption, not a promise. Long-run returns depend on how the money is invested:

• A portfolio mostly in stock index funds has historically averaged higher returns, with large swings from year to year.
• A balanced mix of stocks and bonds has averaged less, with smaller drops.
• Target-date funds start stock-heavy and move toward bonds as retirement nears, so their expected return falls over time.

Subtract fees from the rate. A fund with a 0.1% expense ratio barely changes the answer, but 1% in combined fund and advisory fees on a 7% return leaves 6%. Over 25 years with $10,000 a year, 6% grows to about $581,564, while 7% would give noticeably more.

To see the result in today’s dollars, enter the return minus inflation. If you expect 7% returns and 3% inflation, enter 4%. The balance will look smaller, but it tells you roughly what the money will buy.

Catching up if you started late

If the table shows a gap, there are a few levers, roughly in order of effect:

• Raise the yearly deposit. Each extra $1,000 a year at 7% adds about $27,000 over 15 years and about $101,000 over 30.
• Work a few more years. Two or three extra years of contributions, plus two or three fewer years of withdrawals, closes a large gap.
• Use catch-up contributions after 50, which let you put more into a 401(k) and IRA than younger savers can.
• Cut fees. Moving from high-cost funds to low-cost index funds raises the net return without extra risk.
• Delay Social Security. Each year you wait past full retirement age, up to 70, raises the benefit by about 8%, which reduces how much your savings must cover.

Run the calculator again after each change to see which one moves your number the most.

Which accounts this fits

The calculator models any account where you make regular yearly contributions and leave the growth in:

• 401(k), 403(b) and 457 plans through work. Payroll contributions arrive every paycheck, which is close to the start-of-year assumption here, especially with a match.
• Traditional and Roth IRAs. Many people fund an IRA in one deposit each year, which this calculator matches exactly. You can contribute for a tax year until the filing deadline in April of the following year.
• SEP IRAs and solo 401(k)s for self-employed people.
• Health savings accounts invested for the long term.

Contribution limits for all of these are set by the IRS and usually rise each year with inflation. People aged 50 and over can make extra catch-up contributions. Check the current limits on irs.gov before you plan around a figure.

If you contribute monthly and want the monthly detail, or plan to raise your contribution each year, the monthly investment calculator has a monthly schedule and a yearly step-up.

Taxes inside and outside the account

The balance shown is before any tax on withdrawal:

• Traditional 401(k) and IRA: contributions are usually deducted from taxable income now, growth is tax-deferred, and withdrawals are taxed as ordinary income in retirement.
• Roth 401(k) and Roth IRA: contributions are made from after-tax money, and qualified withdrawals, including all the growth, are tax-free.
• Taxable brokerage account: dividends are taxed each year and gains when you sell, which lowers the effective growth rate.

A traditional account with $606,438 in it is worth less to you than a Roth account with the same balance, because part of it belongs to the IRS. If you have both, plan on the after-tax value of each.

How much is enough?

A common starting point is the 4% rule: a retirement portfolio can support withdrawals of about 4% of the starting balance a year, adjusted for inflation, for around 30 years in most historical periods. On that basis, $1 million would support about $40,000 a year, on top of Social Security. It is a rough guide, not a guarantee, and many planners now use a more cautious 3% to 3.5% for long retirements. Work out the yearly income you want, subtract expected Social Security and any pension, and divide the gap by 0.04 to get a target. Then adjust the yearly deposit here until the balance reaches it.

For money you need sooner, such as a house deposit in five years, guaranteed products fit better. Compare the CD calculator and the savings plan calculator.

Revisit the plan once a year. Enter your real balance as a lump sum in the CD calculator to project it forward, and run this calculator for your future deposits. Adding the two gives an updated estimate.

The calculator runs in your browser. Your figures are not sent or saved.

Learn more

How retirement savings compound covers the math and the effect of starting ten years earlier. How much to save for retirement each year turns a target balance into a yearly figure.

Frequently asked questions

How much should I save for retirement each year?

A common guideline is 15% of gross income, including any employer match, starting in your twenties or early thirties. Starting later means saving more. To reach $1 million by retirement at a 7% return, you would need about $9,900 a year over 30 years or about $22,800 a year over 20 years.

What rate of return should I assume for retirement planning?

Many planners use 5% to 7% a year for a stock-heavy portfolio over long periods, after fees and before inflation. Use less if you hold more bonds or are close to retirement. Running the calculator at two or three rates gives a range that is more honest than a single figure.

Does the calculator include my employer match?

Only if you include it in the yearly deposit. Add your contributions and your employer’s together. If you put in $6,000 a year and your employer matches half, enter $9,000. The match is free money, so contributing at least enough to get all of it is usually the first step.

Why does the calculator assume deposits at the start of the year?

Because it matches the two most common patterns closely: a lump-sum IRA contribution early in the year and steady payroll contributions throughout it. If you always contribute at the end of the year instead, the result is slightly high. Reducing the rate by about half a point roughly corrects for that.

What if I stop contributing before retirement?

The balance keeps growing even without new deposits. Run the calculator for the years you will contribute and note the balance. Then use the CD calculator with that balance as a lump sum, your expected return and the remaining years until retirement to see roughly what it grows to. It is an estimate, since the CD calculator assumes a fixed rate.

Is a Roth or traditional account better?

It depends on your tax rate now compared with your expected rate in retirement. If you expect a higher rate later, a Roth tends to win. If your rate is high now and will be lower in retirement, traditional contributions usually come out ahead. Many people split contributions between both to spread the tax risk.