Finances & BudgetingFree budget tool
Put 50% of each paycheck toward needs, 30% toward wants and 20% toward savings and debt. Enter your take-home pay to see the amounts, then add your bills to check the needs money arrives before each one is due.
Highlights
This planner splits every paycheck (or monthly salary) into buckets, such as bills, savings and spending. Then it gives each bill to the payday that has to pay it.
If a later paycheck can't cover its bills, it tells you how much to keep back from an earlier one. It works with any pay schedule, more than one income, and every currency in use around the world.
The example below is already filled in. Change the income in Step 1, the buckets in Step 2 and the bills in Step 3. The results in Step 4 update as you type.
ExampleExample figures loaded. Change anything.
Add every income you get paid from.
Fixed amounts first, then percentages. "What's left" takes the rest.
Per paycheck $1,000.00
Per paycheck $600.00
Per paycheck $400.00
Monthly bills and the day they're due.
Paying ahead
A buffer for slow transfers. A bill due just after a payday is paid from the paycheck before it.
Your split
Salary: $2,000.00, every two weeks
Each bill goes to the latest payday before its pay-by date.
October 2026
Hold back $500.00
Salary $2,000.00
Bills $140.00 from $1,000.00 bills money
Keep $500.00 of this payday's bills money for the Oct 23 payday, which can't cover its bills alone. $360.00 is still free.
Short by $500.00
Salary $2,000.00
Bills $1,500.00 from $1,000.00 bills money
Covered by money held back from an earlier payday.
50/30/20 budgeting guide
The 50/30/20 rule is the simplest budget there is: half for needs, 30% for wants, 20% for the future. This calculator applies it to each paycheck, then checks the part most budgets skip: whether the needs money arrives before each bill is due.
Want a different split or several incomes? The paycheck split calculator handles any split.
The three buckets
Sort each cost by one question: would I still have to pay this if my income stopped?
Worked example
The example in the calculator: a 2,000 paycheck every two weeks, split 50/30/20.
Each paycheck puts 1,000 in needs. The bills are a phone plan, internet, a 300 car loan due on the 28th and 1,200 rent due on the 1st, which come to 1,640 a month. In a typical month needs gets about 2,167, so the rule works.
But rent for November and the car loan both fall to the October 23 paycheck, the last one before they're due. That's 1,500 of bills for 1,000 of needs money: 500 short.
The October 9 paycheck only has 140 of bills, so the calculator says to hold back 500 of its needs money for the 23rd. The other 360 is free.
| Payday | Needs money | Bills | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oct 9 | 1,000 | 140 | Hold back 500 · 360 free |
| Oct 23 | 1,000 | 1,500 | Short by 500 |
Quick reference
How common take-home amounts divide under the rule.
| Take-home pay | Needs (50%) | Wants (30%) | Savings & debt (20%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1,000 | 500 | 300 | 200 |
| 1,500 | 750 | 450 | 300 |
| 2,000 | 1,000 | 600 | 400 |
| 3,000 | 1,500 | 900 | 600 |
| 4,000 | 2,000 | 1,200 | 800 |
Works for any currency, per paycheck or per month.
Popular splits
Not sure where to start? Load one of these into the planner, then adjust the percentages to fit your bills.
Half of each paycheck for needs such as rent, bills and food, 30% for wants, and 20% for savings and paying off debt. The most widely used starting point.
Needs 50% · Wants 30% · Savings & debt 20%
70% for living costs, 20% for savings and 10% for debt or giving. Suits higher-cost cities, where needs alone take more than half.
Living costs 70% · Savings 20% · Debt or giving 10%
60% for needs, 20% for savings and 20% for wants. A middle ground when 50% for needs is too tight.
Needs 60% · Savings 20% · Wants 20%
Move 20% to savings the day you're paid, then pay bills and live on the other 80%. The simplest split to stick to.
Savings 20% · Everything else 80%
The same for any currency: 2,000 dollars, pounds, euros or rand.
| Split | Each bucket gets |
|---|---|
| 50/30/20 | Needs 1,000 · Wants 600 · Savings & debt 400 |
| 70/20/10 | Living costs 1,400 · Savings 400 · Debt or giving 200 |
| 60/20/20 | Needs 1,200 · Savings 400 · Wants 400 |
| 80/20 (pay yourself first) | Savings 400 · Everything else 1,600 |
Method
The same rules apply to every plan, so you can check any result by hand.
This is a planning tool, not financial advice. It uses the take-home figures you enter and doesn't work out tax. Last reviewed .
Common questions
Common questions about the 50/30/20 rule and how to use it with each paycheck.
It's a simple way to divide your take-home pay: 50% for needs, 30% for wants and 20% for savings and paying off debt. It was made popular by Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi in their 2005 book All Your Worth. Instead of tracking every category, you only check three totals.
Net pay, the amount that actually reaches your bank account after tax and deductions. If your employer already takes pension or retirement savings out of your pay, you can count that toward the 20%, and split what's left of the 20% between other savings and debt.
Needs are the costs you'd still have to pay if you lost your job tomorrow: rent or mortgage, utilities, groceries, insurance, transport to work and minimum debt payments. Wants are everything you could cut: eating out, streaming, holidays, hobbies and upgrades. Extra debt payments above the minimum belong in the 20%.
Often not. When rent alone takes 40% of your pay, needs can't fit in 50%. That doesn't mean budgeting has failed. Try 60/20/20 or 70/20/10 instead, and keep the habit of moving savings first. You can change any percentage in the planner and see straight away whether each payday still covers its bills.
Apply it to each paycheck rather than to the month. Each paycheck puts 50% in needs. The catch is that big bills such as rent don't split evenly between paydays, so one paycheck's needs money may be short. The planner shows which one, and how much of the other to hold back.
Ready-made plans
The same planner with a different starting plan. Your saved plan comes with you to each one.
Related tools
Turn a photo of a bill list or payslip into rows or text. These tools also run in your browser, with nothing uploaded.