50/30/20 Budget Calculator
Most 50/30/20 calculators just multiply your income by three percentages — which you could do in your head. This one also takes what you really spend, so you see the gap between the rule and your life, and which bucket is causing it.
Your 50/30/20 targets vs. reality
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The 50/30/20 rule describes one month. To see whether that 20% actually survives the year — annual insurance, holidays, the months with five weekends — carry it forward with the cumulative budget calculator.
Try Cumulative Budget free →Why the gap matters more than the split
The percentages are easy; living inside them is not. Knowing that your needs should be 1,750 is useless on its own — what changes behaviour is seeing that they are 1,900, that the extra 150 comes out of savings every month, and that twelve of those months is an entire emergency fund you never built.
That is also the rule's blind spot. It describes a single average month, and average months do not include the annual insurance premium or the holiday. A budget that passes 50/30/20 on paper can still run dry in the month three bills land together — which is what a running-balance projection catches and a percentage split cannot.
Frequently asked questions
What is the 50/30/20 rule?
It splits your take-home pay three ways: 50% to needs (rent, food, utilities, transport, insurance, minimum debt payments), 30% to wants (eating out, hobbies, travel, subscriptions) and 20% to savings and extra debt repayment. It is a guideline for proportions, not a budget in itself.
Is it 50/30/20 of gross or net income?
Net — the money that actually lands in your account after tax and social contributions. Using gross income inflates all three buckets and makes the rule impossible to hit.
What counts as a need rather than a want?
A need is something that has real consequences if you stop paying it: housing, utilities, basic groceries, commuting to work, insurance, minimum loan payments. Everything that is a nicer version of a need — a bigger flat, a restaurant instead of groceries — is partly a want. Where exactly you draw the line matters less than drawing it the same way every month.
What if my needs are well over 50%?
That is common where rent is high, and it does not mean the budget has failed. It means the 30% wants bucket has to shrink to protect the 20% savings bucket. The rule's real value is the ranking: savings are not whatever happens to be left over.
Does the rule work with an irregular income?
Apply it to a conservative month — roughly your lowest normal income — rather than your average. In good months the extra lands on top of the 20%, which is what smooths the bad ones.