Retirement Withdrawal Calculator (How Long Will It Last?)
Enter your balance and a monthly withdrawal to see how long the money lasts, or flip the switch to solve for the withdrawal your savings can sustain over a set number of years.
What you're withdrawing from, in today's dollars
Solve for
In today's dollars
After inflation. 4% is a cautious real-return assumption
Your money lasts
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Enter a balance and a withdrawal
Total withdrawn
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Balance after 20 years
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Sequence risk, in plain words
Averages hide the thing that ruins retirements. A portfolio that returns 5% a year on average can still fail if the bad years come first, because every withdrawal taken during a downturn sells assets at low prices that never get to recover. The same crash twenty years in barely matters; the same crash in year two can be fatal to the plan. This calculator uses a steady return, so read its answer as the middle of the road: reality could run longer, and the early-bad-luck version runs meaningfully shorter. The practical defenses are a conservative withdrawal rate and flexibility, meaning the willingness to trim spending in bad years.
The 4% rule is this math with history attached
The famous rule wasn't derived from a formula; it came from running exactly this depletion math against every historical 30-year stretch of U.S. market returns and asking what starting withdrawal rate survived all of them. That's the story our 4% rule guide tells in full. Flip this calculator to "safe monthly amount" with a 30-year horizon and a modest real return and you'll land in the same neighborhood, which is a good sign: the rule is ordinary annuity math wearing historical armor. The savings-side mirror of this question, how big the balance must get in the first place, lives in the FIRE calculator and the retirement calculator.
Inflation is already inside the numbers
The convention here does quiet work: because you enter an after-inflation return, the fixed monthly withdrawal you see is really an inflation-adjusted one. A $3,500 withdrawal in year twenty buys what $3,500 buys today; in actual future dollars the check will be larger, growing with prices. If you'd like to feel why that adjustment matters so much over decades, the inflation calculator and our guide to inflation and savings make it concrete. The other half of staying on plan is knowing what you actually spend, month by month, which is the picture Stoia keeps live so the withdrawal plan and the real spending never drift apart unnoticed.
Frequently asked questions
How long will my savings last in retirement?
It's a race between growth and withdrawals. Each month the balance earns a little and loses what you take out; if withdrawals exceed growth, the balance shrinks and the shrinking accelerates, because a smaller balance earns less. This calculator runs that month-by-month race for your numbers.
What is a safe withdrawal rate?
The classic benchmark is 4% of the starting balance per year, adjusted for inflation, which historically survived 30-year retirements in the U.S. Longer horizons or more caution argue for 3-3.5%. The 'safe monthly amount' mode here solves the same problem directly from your balance, return, and time horizon.
Does this account for inflation?
Yes, through the return assumption. Enter an after-inflation (real) return and every result reads in today's dollars: the monthly withdrawal keeps constant purchasing power, and the future balances mean what they say in current prices.
What is sequence-of-returns risk?
The danger that bad market years arrive early in retirement, while withdrawals are locking in the losses. Two retirees with identical average returns can end up in opposite places if one hits a crash in year two and the other in year twenty. A steady-return calculator can't show this, which is one reason to keep withdrawal rates conservative.
What if my withdrawals are smaller than the growth?
Then the balance never falls and the money lasts indefinitely at that spending level. The calculator flags this case: it means your withdrawal is at or below the portfolio's sustainable yield under the return you assumed.
Does this calculator save my numbers?
No. Everything runs in your browser and disappears when you leave. Nothing is uploaded or stored.
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