How much can I spend this month?
Enter what comes in and what is already spoken for — housing, bills, debt payments, savings and investments — and see what is left for flexible spending, per month, per week and per day. Free, no account, and nothing you type leaves your browser.
The calculator
Your number
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Enter your monthly take-home income to start. Every other box can stay blank if it does not apply to you.
About this calculation
What flexible spending means
It is what is left when the month's fixed obligations are taken off your take-home pay: housing, recurring bills, debt payments, and the money you have decided to save or invest. What remains is the part you actually make choices about — groceries, eating out, transport, everything discretionary.
Why bills and savings come out first
Saving whatever survives to the end of the month usually means saving very little, because spending expands to fill whatever is in the account. Taking contributions off the top alongside the bills makes them a commitment like any other, and it makes the number left over an honest one.
How the calculation works
Your housing, bills, debt payments, savings and investments are added up. That total is subtracted from your monthly take-home income, and what is left is your flexible spending for the month. The weekly figure divides it by 52/12 weeks rather than 4 — a month is not four weeks, and dividing by 4 would overstate it by about 8%. The daily figure divides by the days you have left in the month if you gave us one, and by an average month (365/12 days) if you did not.
Why your actual spending will differ
This is arithmetic on the numbers you entered, not a forecast. Bills vary, an annual premium lands in one month and not the next, income changes, and something unplanned always turns up. Treat the result as a starting figure to plan against, and revisit it when the inputs change.
This calculator is a budgeting tool, not financial advice. It describes the numbers you entered and nothing else — it cannot know your circumstances, and no figure it shows is a recommendation about what you should spend, save or borrow.
Other calculators
- Daily spending limitTake what is left of this month's flexible spending, divide it by the days you have left, and see what that is a day.
- Can I afford it?Check one purchase against the money you have left this month, and see what it leaves for the days that follow.
- Savings goalSet an amount and a date, and see what it takes per month, per paycheck and per week to get there.
- Salary budgetTurn a salary at any pay frequency into a monthly take-home figure, split into essentials, saving and flexible spending.
Keeping the number, month after month
PAY/ATTN is the same subtraction, done properly: you count what is coming in, subtract the bills, set savings and investing aside first, split what is left into a limit per category, and lock it before the month starts. Then you log what you spend against those limits by hand — which is what makes you notice.