Retirement Savings Calculator
Calculate how much you need to save for retirement in a 401(k), Traditional IRA, or Roth IRA — including employer match and 2026 contribution limits.
Your retirement goal
A rough placeholder, not a real benefit calculation. Get your personalized estimate at ssa.gov/myaccount — as a rule of thumb, Social Security typically replaces about 25-40% of pre-retirement income.
Your account and contributions
Roth means you pay taxes now and withdrawals are tax-free later; Traditional and 401(k) mean you get a tax break now and pay taxes on withdrawals in retirement.
3-3.5% is more conservative than the classic 4% FIRE rule, for longer retirement horizons.
Employer match (optional)
Used to calculate your employer match.
E.g., 50 = your employer adds $0.50 per $1 you contribute.
E.g., 6 = matched only up to 6% of your pay.
Monthly contribution needed
$1,301
To reach your goal in 32 years (on top of your employer match)
With your current contribution, your projected savings fall short of your goal. You'll need to contribute more.
Target capital at retirement
$2,342,279
Projected capital (current contribution)
$1,054,646
Employer match (monthly)
$175
Employer match (annual)
$2,100
Calculation detail
Estimate calculated from the numbers you entered. This is not financial, tax, or legal advice — always consult a qualified professional before making significant financial decisions.
What this retirement savings calculator does
It calculates how much capital you need to build up so that, combined with a rough Social Security estimate, it covers the monthly spending you want in retirement — and what monthly contribution gets you there in the years you have left. Choose a 401(k) (with an optional employer match), a Traditional IRA, or a Roth IRA, and the calculator checks your planned contribution against the actual 2026 IRS annual limits for your account type and age. Unlike the FIRE Calculator, this one assumes a conventional retirement age and a more conservative withdrawal rate, built for a longer and less predictable retirement horizon.
- What you contribute
- What the interest adds
The formulas
Target capital
Target = (Desired spending − Estimated Social Security) × 12 / Withdrawal rateEmployer match (401(k) only)
Match = Salary × min(Your contribution rate, Match ceiling) × Match %Monthly contribution needed
PMT = [Target − Savings × (1 + i)n] × i / [(1 + i)n− 1]Your desired monthly spending is first inflation-adjusted to the year you retire, so the target capital is expressed in dollars at that future point, not today's dollars. The employer match is calculated from your salary and contribution rate, then added on top of your own contribution before the growth projection runs.
A worked example
At age 35, retiring at 67, with desired spending of $5,000/month and a rough Social Security estimate of $1,900/month, the gap to cover with your own savings is $3,100/month in today's dollars — which, inflated at 2.5% over 32 years, comes to roughly $6,832/month at retirement. At a 3.5% withdrawal rate, the target capital works out to about $2,342,000. Starting from $25,000 already saved in a 401(k), contributing $400/month with a $70,000 salary and a 50% match up to 6% of pay (that's $175/month in employer match, since 6% of $70,000 is the matched ceiling) at a 7% expected return, the projection reaches roughly $1,055,000 — short of the target, which means the required contribution to actually get there is meaningfully higher than $400/month.
Common retirement-planning mistakes
- Leaving employer match money on the table: if your employer matches contributions up to a certain percentage of pay and you're contributing less than that, you're turning down part of your own compensation. Contributing at least enough to capture the full match is usually the first move before anything else.
- Ignoring inflation:$5,000/month today isn't the same as $5,000/month in 30 years; skipping the inflation adjustment badly underestimates the real target capital.
- Treating a rough Social Security number as guaranteed: the estimate you enter here is a placeholder, not a benefit calculation — get a personalized estimate from ssa.gov/myaccount and revisit it periodically, since your claiming age and earnings history both move the real number.
- Blowing past the annual contribution limit: you can only shelter so much per year in a 401(k) or IRA — plan any extra savings toward a taxable brokerage account or a different account type rather than assuming you can contribute an unlimited amount to one plan.
- Starting late: the fewer years left until retirement, the higher the required monthly contribution for the same target, since compound growth has less time to do the work.
Frequently asked questions
How is this different from the FIRE Calculator?
The FIRE Calculator is built for people who want to reach financial independence and stop working well before a normal retirement age, typically using a 4% withdrawal rate and no Social Security at all. This calculator assumes a more conventional path: you retire around a typical retirement age, your 401(k)/IRA savings work alongside a rough Social Security estimate, and it uses a more conservative withdrawal rate (3-3.5%) because a normal-age retirement horizon tends to run longer and is harder to predict than a FIRE plan.
What's the real difference between a 401(k), a Traditional IRA, and a Roth IRA?
A 401(k) is an employer-sponsored plan — its biggest advantage is that many employers match part of what you contribute, which is close to free money. A Traditional IRA is opened on your own and, like a 401(k), typically gives you a tax deduction on contributions now, with withdrawals taxed as ordinary income in retirement. A Roth IRA flips that: you contribute after-tax dollars now (no deduction), but qualified withdrawals in retirement — including all the growth — are completely tax-free. Which one wins depends mostly on whether you expect your tax rate to be higher or lower in retirement than it is today; this calculator does not model that comparison, since it depends on future tax law and your personal bracket.
How does the employer match work in this calculator?
You enter your annual salary, the match percentage (for example, 50% means your employer adds $0.50 for every dollar you contribute), and the match ceiling as a percentage of your salary (for example, 6% means only your first 6% of pay is matched). The calculator matches whichever is smaller — your actual contribution rate or the ceiling — and adds that dollar amount to your monthly contribution before projecting growth. It does not model a vesting schedule (the years you may need to stay employed before the match is fully yours); check your plan documents for that detail.
What happens if I enter a contribution above the 2026 IRS limit?
The calculator does not silently cap your number or quietly let it through — it flags it. Employee contribution limits for 2026 are $24,500 for a 401(k) ($8,000 more if you're 50 or older, or $11,250 more specifically at ages 60-63, which replaces rather than stacks with the 50+ catch-up), and $7,500 for a Traditional or Roth IRA ($1,100 more at 50+). If your entered contribution is above the limit for your account type and age, you'll see a warning — the projection still runs with the number you typed so you can see the math, but you won't actually be able to contribute that amount to a single account in real life.
How accurate is the Social Security estimate?
It isn't a real benefit calculation — it's whatever you type in. The Social Security Administration's actual formula (Average Indexed Monthly Earnings, bend points, and your Primary Insurance Amount) requires your full 35-year earnings history, so it can't be reproduced from a handful of calculator inputs without being misleadingly precise. As a rough starting point, Social Security has historically been cited by the SSA itself as replacing roughly 25-40% of pre-retirement income for most earners, but your real number depends heavily on your earnings history and the age you claim at (as early as 62, or later for a larger monthly check). For a personalized estimate based on your actual earnings record, use the SSA's own calculator at ssa.gov/myaccount.
Do I need to worry about Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs)?
Not for this calculator's projection, but yes for real planning: under the SECURE 2.0 Act, most Traditional 401(k) and IRA accounts require you to start taking Required Minimum Distributions at age 73, whether you need the income or not (Roth IRAs are exempt from RMDs during the original owner's lifetime). This calculator doesn't model RMDs since they affect the withdrawal phase, not the accumulation phase it projects — but it's worth knowing about well before you get there.
What actually moves this number
Specific levers, and roughly what each one is worth. Not “save more” — the things that change the figure above by an amount you can measure.
Capture the full employer match before anything else
A 50% match on the first 6% of pay is a 50% return the moment it lands. On an $80,000 salary that is $2,400 a year left behind for contributing 5% instead of 6%. No investment decision competes with it.
Raise the deferral percentage with every raise
Going from 6% to 7% the same month your pay rises 4% is nearly invisible in your paycheck and permanently resets the trajectory. Doing it once a year for a decade does more than any fund selection you will make.
Check your vesting schedule before changing jobs
Employer contributions may require years of service to become fully yours. If you are three months from a vesting cliff, that is a real number worth putting on the offer comparison.
Look up your actual Social Security estimate
The SSA publishes a personalized figure in your online account, computed from your real earnings record. It is more reliable than any assumption, and for many households it changes the required portfolio by several hundred thousand dollars.
What this calculator does not cover
Every calculator simplifies, and the useful thing is knowing exactly where. These are the specific gaps between this estimate and your real situation:
- Returns are a smooth constant rate; real sequences vary and the order matters once you begin withdrawing.
- It does not apply taxes on withdrawal. A traditional 401(k) balance and a Roth balance of the same size fund very different amounts of spending.
- Required minimum distributions are not modeled. Traditional accounts force taxable withdrawals on the IRS schedule in your seventies whether or not you need the money.
- Employer match rules, vesting schedules, and plan-specific limits are not modeled — check your plan documents for those.
- Contribution limits are indexed annually. A multi-decade projection at today's limit understates what you will be permitted to contribute in later years.
For anything that turns on an exact figure, use the primary sources below or a qualified professional. How these limits are decided and disclosed is described in the editorial standards.
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