Enter your age, income, and savings to see how much you're on track to have at retirement, and how much you'll actually need.
Two numbers matter for retirement: what you're on track to have, and what you'll actually need. This calculator projects your current savings plus monthly contributions forward to retirement age, then compares that to a target based on replacing 80% of your income.
Aiming for 80% of what you're making gives you stress-free flexibility, you'll likely have paid off debts by retirement, so money that used to go to bills becomes wiggle room for emergencies or the urge to splurge. Want to live large? Bump it to 100% under "More options."
The target uses the classic 4% rule: if you withdraw about 4% of your nest egg each year, it should last through a long retirement. Flip that around and you need roughly 25 times your desired annual retirement income saved by the day you stop working.
The gap number can look scary, but small changes compound. Saving even a little more each month, working a couple of extra years, or nudging your savings into investments with higher expected returns can move the needle dramatically over decades.
Get Nicole's latest articles, guides, and plain-English money answers.