Budget calculator (50/30/20 rule)
Enter your take-home pay to see the recommended split across needs, wants, and savings, then compare it to what you're actually spending.
Your monthly income
Use your take-home (after-tax) pay, not your gross salary.
What you're actually spending (optional)
Fill these in to see how your real spending compares to the recommended split. Leave at 0 to just see the recommended amounts.
Your recommended budget
What the 50/30/20 rule actually means
The 50/30/20 rule splits your after-tax income into three buckets: 50% for needs, 30% for wants, and 20% for savings and debt payoff beyond the minimums. It’s a starting framework, not a law — high cost-of-living areas often push “needs” well past 50%, and that’s normal, not a personal failing.
Needs are the costs you can’t avoid without a real consequence: rent or mortgage, utilities, groceries, insurance, minimum debt payments, transportation to work.
Wants are everything discretionary: dining out, subscriptions, entertainment, hobbies, non-essential shopping.
Savings & debt covers anything beyond the minimums: extra debt payoff, emergency fund contributions, retirement, investing.
How to use this calculator well
Use your take-home pay, not your gross salary — taxes are already gone before you can budget them. If you’re not sure what you’re actually spending in each category, pull your last month of bank and card statements and categorize every transaction once. It’s tedious the first time and takes ten minutes every month after that.
Common mistakes
- Using gross income instead of take-home pay — this makes every percentage look smaller than reality.
- Miscategorizing “wants” as “needs” — a streaming subscription is a want, even if it doesn’t feel optional.
- Treating 50/30/20 as fixed — if your needs are 65% because of where you live, the fix is adjusting the wants/savings split, not abandoning the framework.
FAQ
What if my needs are more than 50% of my income? Common in high cost-of-living areas. Try compressing wants toward 15-20% and savings toward 10-15% instead, and look for ways to reduce fixed costs where possible.
Does this work for irregular income (freelance, commission)? Yes, but budget off your average or lowest recent month rather than your best month, and build a bigger buffer into savings during good months.