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Budgeting

50/30/20 budget calculator

The rule is simple enough to do in your head: half on needs, a third on wants, a fifth saved. The useful part is the second half of this page, where you put in what you actually spend and find out how far off it is.

Your income

Currency

Changes the symbol on your figures. It does not convert them — there is no exchange rate here.

What actually arrives in your account.

Optional. Leave at zero to see the targets only.

Your targets

Needs — 50%

—

  • Rent or mortgage
  • Groceries
  • Utilities
  • Insurance
  • Transport
  • Minimum debt payments
  • Childcare

Wants — 30%

—

  • Restaurants
  • Streaming
  • Shopping
  • Gym
  • Holidays
  • Hobbies
  • Upgrades

Savings — 20%

—

  • Emergency fund
  • Pension
  • Index funds
  • Extra debt payments
  • House deposit

—

Target against actual
CategoryTargetActualDifference

This calculator needs JavaScript to recalculate. The figures above are a worked example, and every assumption behind them is written out below.

What this assumes

The split is on take-home pay — after tax and after anything deducted at source. If your pension comes out before you see it, either add it back to income and count it as savings, or leave it out of both.

The 50/30/20 proportions are fixed, because they are the rule. Making them adjustable would make it a different rule, and the reader looking for this one wants this one.

Where the rule breaks

In an expensive city, housing alone can be 40% of take-home pay and the 50% needs bucket is gone before food. The rule is not wrong so much as it is describing a cost of living that not everyone has.

When that happens, the useful move is not to abandon it but to note which number is doing the damage. If needs are at 65%, no amount of discipline on the wants bucket fixes it — that is a housing or an income problem, and it deserves to be named as one rather than treated as a failure of budgeting.

The 20% is the only part that compounds

Needs and wants are consumed. The savings line is the only one that is still there next year, and it is the one that decides when you stop having to work. If a month has to give somewhere, it is worth knowing which bucket you are actually raiding.

Debt sits in two buckets at once

Minimum payments are a need — you have to make them. Anything above the minimum is savings, because it is buying down a future obligation. Splitting it that way keeps the rule honest for someone paying off a card aggressively.

Common questions

What is the 50/30/20 rule?
A budgeting guideline popularised by Elizabeth Warren: 50% of take-home pay on needs, 30% on wants, 20% on savings and debt repayment. Its value is that it is simple enough to remember and check against, rather than requiring a category for everything.
Is it before or after tax?
After. The rule works on take-home pay — what lands in your account. If contributions are deducted before you see your salary, the cleanest approach is to add them back into income and count them within the 20%.
What if my needs are more than 50%?
Common, and usually housing. Note it rather than treating it as a personal failing: it means the wants and savings buckets have to share what is left, and it identifies the one change — housing cost or income — that would actually move things.
Where does debt repayment go?
Minimum payments are needs; anything extra counts within the 20%, because overpaying debt is a form of saving. Putting the whole payment in either bucket distorts the picture for anyone in an active payoff plan.

The app this comes from

The rule is easy. Knowing your real split is not

Almost everyone underestimates the wants bucket, because it arrives in small amounts across a whole month while the needs arrive as a few large bills. The only way to know the real proportion is to have logged it.

Not out yet. TLDR Money International is in build for the United States and the United Kingdom first, on iPhone and Android. There is nothing to download and nothing to sign up to — when there is, this page will say so.

Last reviewed 20 August 2026. The arithmetic behind this page is covered by automated tests that run on every deploy.