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Financial independence

FIRE calculator

Most FIRE calculators multiply your spending by 25 and stop. This one runs the year-by-year ledger underneath that number. A state pension starting at 67, or a house deposit at 45, changes the answer here the same way it would change it in your life.

Your position

Currency

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

What a year costs you once you stop working, in today’s money.

Pensions, index funds, shares. Not the home you live in.

Everything you add, including any employer match.

%

Before inflation. 6–8% is a common long-run assumption for a global equity mix.

%

Removed from the return, so every figure below is in today’s money.

%

4% is the classic rule. 3.5% is the common adjustment for a retirement longer than thirty years.

Annual, in today’s money. Leave at zero to ignore it.

You could stop working in

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FIRE number (25× rule)

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What you actually need

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Coast number today

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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

Every figure is real — in today’s money. A result of 1,200,000 means “what 1,200,000 buys today”, not the number that will be in the account. That is what lets the same arithmetic serve dollars, pounds and euros.

Contributions and withdrawals are assumed to happen through the year, not on the last day of it, so they earn half a year of growth. Growing the portfolio first and subtracting spending afterwards would credit you with a full year’s return on money you spent in January.

The home you live in is not counted, because you cannot spend the roof. Enter only what could actually fund your spending.

The plan is allowed to end at zero. “What you actually need” is the smallest portfolio that survives to your planning age, which is why it usually comes in below the 25× rule — the rule is closer to funding a perpetuity. If you want to leave an estate, or you would rather not cut it that fine, use the 25× figure instead.

No tax is modelled by default. Three countries, three regimes, and a made-up effective rate would be worse than an honest omission. If your withdrawals will be taxed, raise your spending figure to the gross amount.

The 25× rule, and where it stops being true

Multiply your annual spending by 25 and you have the number every FIRE article quotes. It is the 4% withdrawal rate turned upside down, and as a first estimate it is genuinely good.

It assumes four things, though, and at least one of them is false for most people: that your spending is flat for the rest of your life, that no other income ever arrives, that nothing large is ever bought, and that a thirty-year historical study applies to a retirement that might run fifty years.

The second is the one that moves the answer most. If a state pension or Social Security payment starts at 67, your portfolio only has to carry you to 67 at full weight — after that it is topping up, not paying for everything. That can cut the number you need by a quarter or more, and no multiple-of-spending rule can see it. Put a pension figure in above and watch the second stat change.

Why the answer is a year, not an amount

A target of 1.2 million is a fact about your spending. The year you reach it is a fact about your life, and it is the one that changes what you do on Monday.

It is also the figure that responds to the decisions you actually control. Adding to what you invest each year moves it. Cutting what you will spend moves it twice over, because it lowers the target and raises the surplus at the same time. The return assumption moves it too, and you control none of that — which is worth remembering before optimising it.

Lean, regular and fat

The three named variants are the same arithmetic with a different spending figure. Lean is roughly 70% of your number, fat is around 150%, and the labels mean nothing in the absolute — lean in San Francisco is comfortable in most of Europe. Change the spending field rather than looking for a preset.

Common questions

What is a realistic return to assume?
Somewhere between 6% and 8% before inflation is the usual assumption for a globally diversified equity portfolio, based on long-run history. This calculator then removes inflation from it, so 7% with 2.5% inflation becomes about 4.1% real — not 4.5%, because the two compound against each other rather than subtracting. Being conservative here costs you nothing but a later date on paper; being optimistic costs you actual years.
Should I use 4% or something lower?
The 4% rule comes from studies of thirty-year retirements. If you stop working at 45, you may need the money to last fifty years, and the common adjustment for that is 3.5% or even 3.25%. The difference is not small: at 40,000 of spending, 4% needs a million and 3.5% needs about 1.14 million.
Does it include my house?
No, and it should not. A home you live in produces no income and cannot be sold without buying or renting somewhere else. It belongs on a net worth statement, not in a retirement projection. If you intend to sell it and downsize, enter the amount you expect to free up as part of your invested total instead.
What about tax?
Nothing is modelled by default, because this site serves the US, the UK and Europe and each has entirely different rules for retirement withdrawals. The honest workaround is to enter your spending figure gross — what you need to withdraw before tax rather than what lands in your account.
Does the currency switch convert my numbers?
No. It changes the symbol and leaves every figure exactly as you typed it. Because all the arithmetic is in real terms, the same inputs give the same answer in years regardless of which currency they represent — so there is nothing to convert. It is a display preference, and it is remembered.

The app this comes from

The hard part is knowing what you actually spend

Every number on this page depends on one figure you have to be honest about: what a year costs you. TLDR Money is built so that logging a coffee and seeing your FIRE date are the same app rather than two — you enter spending by typing, speaking or scanning a receipt, keep your own asset and liability values, and the projection reads from them.

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.