Retirement Calculator

What this calculator does

Retirement projections usually fail in one of two ways: they ignore the employer match (understating your savings) or they quote everything in future dollars (overstating what the money will buy). This calculator avoids both. It simulates your balance year by year with your contribution percentage, your employer’s match formula, annual salary raises, and investment returns — then deflates the result by inflation so the headline number is stated in today’s purchasing power. The chart shows both curves; the gap between them is inflation doing its quiet work.

How the math works

Each simulated year:

1. You contribute your percentage of that year’s salary.
2. Your employer matches: match = salary × min(your %, match limit %) × match rate.
3. The balance grows: balance = previous balance × (1 + return) + contributions.
4. Salary rises by your raise assumption for next year.

The real (today’s-dollars) balance divides each year’s nominal balance by (1 + inflation)ʸᵉᵃʳˢ.

The mechanics in miniature, with easy numbers: salary $100,000, you contribute 10%, employer matches 50% up to 6%, return 10%, starting balance $10,000. After one year: 10,000 × 1.10 + 10,000 (you) + 3,000 (match: 50% of 6% of salary) = $24,000. Every year repeats that pattern on a bigger base — that repetition is the whole engine.

A worked example

The calculator’s default scenario: age 35 to 67, $60,000 saved, $80,000 salary, contributing 10% with a 50% match up to 6%, 2% raises, 7% returns, 2.5% inflation.

Run it and look at three numbers rather than one. The nominal balance at 67 is the eye-catcher, but the today’s-dollars balance is the honest answer — at 2.5% inflation over 32 years, every nominal dollar buys about 45 cents of today’s goods. And the lifetime employer match line shows what the match formula quietly adds: at this salary and match, roughly $2,400 a year growing with raises and compounding for decades. Skipping the match by contributing less than 6% would be turning down that entire line item.

Practical tips

1. Capture the full match before anything else. A 50% match is an instant 50% return on contribution — no investment reliably competes. If you contribute below the match limit today, raising it is the highest-yield move available to you.
2. Raise contributions with raises. Bumping your percentage by one point each time your salary rises keeps your lifestyle stable while compounding does more work. At 2% raises, the difference between a flat 10% and stepping up to 15% over five years is dramatic at retirement — test it here.
3. Use today’s-dollars for the “is it enough?” question. Compare the real balance against 25× your expected annual spending (the basis of the 4% rule — see the FIRE calculator). Comparing nominal balances against today’s spending inflates your confidence by exactly the inflation rate compounded.
4. Revisit annually, not daily. One input update per year — actual salary, actual balance — keeps the projection honest. Watching it more often just imports market noise into your planning.

What the smooth curve hides

The projection applies your return assumption identically every year; real portfolios might do −18% one year and +26% the next. Over 30+ years the average dominates, which is why smooth-curve projections remain useful — but in the final five years before retirement, sequence risk (a crash right before withdrawals begin) matters enormously. As the date approaches, planners typically shift toward bonds precisely to trade expected return for a narrower range of outcomes. This calculator tells you if the plan works on average; making it survive bad luck is the next conversation.