FIRE Calculator: How Much Do You Need to Retire Early?
With the default inputs (age 30, $40,000 a year in expenses, 4% safe withdrawal rate), Regular FIRE needs $1.00M, Lean FIRE $600K and Fat FIRE $1.50M. Source for the 4% rate: Trinity Study (1998). Updated .
Estimates for general information only, not financial advice. Read the full disclaimer.
New to FIRE? See how each type works in FIRE Types Explained or read The Complete FIRE Guide. Change any input to try your own numbers; you agree to the terms before they are shown.
Example · default inputs — the age you reach each FIRE type
- Lean 46
- Regular 54
- Fat 61
- Coast 42
- Barista 44
FIRE Timeline
This Scenario's FIRE Numbers
This is an estimate for general informational purposes only. It is not investment, tax, or financial advice. FIREPath is not a law firm, tax advisor, or an investment adviser as defined under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940 — nothing here is a personalized recommendation to buy, sell, or hold any security, or to adopt any particular retirement strategy. These projections are hypothetical: they illustrate what the entered assumptions imply mathematically, not a prediction or guarantee of actual results.
Figures and assumption defaults may be outdated or inaccurate — verify with the official source before relying on them. Consult a licensed financial advisor, tax professional, or attorney before acting on this scenario.
See numbers for your own inputs
The numbers above are an example. Agree to the terms to see results for your own inputs. You can keep adjusting the inputs either way.
Next steps
- Estimate your health insurance before MedicareReaching Regular FIRE at 54 leaves 11 years before Medicare at 65. Estimate what private coverage could cost.
- See how the Regular FIRE target is built$40,000 a year ÷ 4.0% withdrawal rate = $1.0M. The same page covers Lean, Fat, Coast and Barista.
- Read the Complete FIRE GuideWhere the 4% rule comes from, newer withdrawal-rate research and sequence-of-returns risk, with cited sources.
How much do you need to retire early (FIRE)?
At the common defaults (age 30, retiring by 65, $40,000/yr expenses, 4.0% SWR), the baseline Regular FIRE target is $1.00M. Lean FIRE lowers that to $600K; Fat FIRE raises it to $1.50M. As of 2026-10-08, each target equals annual expenses times a fixed multiplier, divided by the safe withdrawal rate.
Updated .
| FIRE Type | Multiplier | Target Amount | Monthly Income |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lean | 60% | $600,000 | $2,000/mo |
| Regular | 100% | $1,000,000 | $3,333/mo |
| Fat | 150% | $1,500,000 | $5,000/mo |
| Coast (seed needed today) | discounted seed | $263,555 | $3,333/mo at retirement |
| Barista | 50% | $500,000 | $1,667/mo |
Factors that affect this number
- Annual living expenses used as the base for the multiplier
- Safe withdrawal rate (SWR) — the percentage drawn from the portfolio each year
- Expected annual investment return (nominal)
- Expected annual inflation rate, which sets the real (inflation-adjusted) return
- Current age and target retirement age
- Current net worth and annual savings rate
- The FIRE type's fixed expense multiplier (0.5x-1.5x)
- 4.0% default Safe Withdrawal Rate — Trinity Study (1998)
- 7% default nominal expected return (FIREPath assumption you can adjust, set below long-run U.S. stock returns) — NYU Stern historical U.S. equity return data
How the FIRE Calculator Works
FIREPath runs five independent FIRE projections from the same nine inputs — current age, retirement age, income, net worth, savings rate, expenses, expected return, inflation, and safe withdrawal rate (SWR). Every calculation happens entirely in your browser; no input is sent to a server. Adjust any slider and all five timelines recompute instantly.
The core formula
Four of the five FIRE types (Lean, Regular, Fat, Barista) use the same shape of formula — a percentage of your annual expenses, divided by your safe withdrawal rate:
FIRE target = (annual expenses × type multiplier) ÷ SWR
The multiplier is what makes each type different: Lean FIRE uses 0.6 (60% of expenses), Regular FIRE uses 1.0 (100%), Fat FIRE uses 1.5 (150%), and Barista FIRE uses 0.5 (50%, since part-time income is assumed to cover the rest). Coast FIREis different: it takes the Regular FIRE target and discounts it backward using your real (inflation-adjusted) return over the years remaining until retirement, so today's nest egg can grow into that target on its own without further contributions.
Real return is derived with the Fisher equation — (1 + nominal return) ÷ (1 + inflation) − 1— the standard way to strip inflation out of a nominal investment return. Full derivations, formulas, and sources for every figure are documented on the methodology page.
Worked example (default scenario)
Using the calculator's default inputs — age 30, retiring at 65, $80,000/yr income, $40,000/yr expenses, a 30% savings rate, 7% expected nominal return, 3% inflation, and a 4% SWR — here is exactly how the Regular FIRE number is derived:
- Annual savings = income × savings rate = $80,000 × 0.3 = $24,000/yr.
- Regular FIRE target = expenses ÷ SWR = $40,000 ÷ 0.04 = $1,000,000.
- Real return = (1 + 0.07) ÷ (1 + 0.03) − 1 = 3.88%.
- Starting from the default net worth, the calculator grows the balance each year at the real (inflation-adjusted) return and adds annual savings, until the portfolio crosses each FIRE type's target — that crossing year becomes the "reach age" shown on the chart and result cards. In this scenario, Regular FIRE is reached at age 54, with projected monthly passive income of $3,333/mo once retired.
All five types run this same year-by-year simulation in parallel from the same starting point — only the target multiplier (or, for Coast, the discounting formula) differs. That is what lets the chart plot all five timelines on one graph for direct comparison.
Figures on this page are calculated with the same formulas as the calculator above, using its default input values. The default assumptions (return, inflation, SWR) and their sources are listed on the methodology page. Adjust any slider above to see your own numbers.
Frequently Asked Questions
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