Enter your income and expenses to see how your spending compares to the 50/30/20 guideline. Get personalized recommendations to improve your financial health.
Half your after-tax income goes to essentials: housing, groceries, utilities, insurance, minimum debt payments, and transportation. These are expenses you cannot easily eliminate.
Up to 30% goes to lifestyle choices: dining out, entertainment, subscriptions, shopping, hobbies, and vacations. These are things you enjoy but could live without if necessary.
At least 20% should go toward financial goals: emergency fund, retirement contributions, extra debt payments beyond minimums, and investing. This is how you build long-term wealth.
The 50/30/20 rule was popularized by Senator Elizabeth Warren in her book All Your Worth: The Ultimate Lifetime Money Plan. It works because it is simple enough to follow consistently while being flexible enough to adapt to different income levels. You do not need to hit the exact percentages, they are guidelines, not rigid rules.
If you live in a high-cost area, your needs might consume more than 50%. That is okay, the goal is awareness. Once you see where your money actually goes, you can make intentional adjustments over time. Even shifting 2-3% from wants to savings can compound into thousands of dollars over a few years.
This budget planner runs entirely in your browser. We do not store, transmit, or see any of the numbers you enter. Your financial data stays on your device.
Say you bring home $4,000 a month after taxes. The 50/30/20 split puts $2,000 toward needs, $1,200 toward wants, and $800 toward savings and extra debt payments. Now suppose your rent, groceries, utilities, insurance, and minimum payments add up to $2,300. That is 58% on needs, not 50%, and the planner flags it in red. That is useful information, not a failure. It tells you the squeeze is coming from fixed costs, so the real fix is structural, a cheaper place at renewal or a refinanced car loan, rather than skipping coffee. Even shifting $100 a month from wants to savings is $1,200 a year, and over five years it compounds into something close to $7,000.
What counts as a need versus a want?
A need is something you cannot easily stop paying without real consequences: housing, utilities, groceries, insurance, transportation to work, and minimum debt payments. A want is a choice you could pause in a tight month, like dining out, streaming, travel, and shopping.
What if I cannot hit 20% savings?
Start with whatever you can, even 5%. The habit matters more than the number at first. As you pay down debt and your income grows, raise the savings slice a point or two at a time.
Does this planner store my numbers?
No. Everything runs in your browser. We never see, store, or transmit anything you enter.