Free Debt Payoff Calculator (+ Guide)

What is a debt payoff calculator?

A debt payoff calculator plans how to pay off several debts from one monthly budget. It adds each month's interest, pays every minimum, and sends the rest to one target debt.

When that debt is gone, its payment rolls into the next one. So the amount you pay never drops, and each debt falls faster than the last.

How to use the debt payoff calculator

Get your statements first, since each debt needs its own numbers.

Your debts stay in this browser, and nothing is sent anywhere.

Avalanche or snowball?

Both methods pay the same total every month. They only differ in which debt gets the extra first.

The avalanche always costs the same or less interest.

But a 2012 study by David Gal and Blakeley McShane in the Journal of Marketing Research found that people who closed small accounts first were more likely to pay off their debt.

So pick the one you'll stick with. The calculator shows what each costs, so you choose with the numbers in front of you.

A worked example

Here's the example the calculator loads when you press Try an example.

The minimums add up to $620 a month. You can pay $1,000, so $380 goes to one debt at a time.

With the avalanche, the credit card goes first and is gone in month 14. The store card follows in month 16, the personal loan in month 19 and the car in month 29.

With the snowball, the store card goes first and is gone in month 3. The personal loan follows in month 9, the credit card in month 19 and the car in month 29.

Both finish in month 29 here, and the avalanche saves $433. The snowball gives you a win in month 3, which is worth something too.

How much a bigger budget saves

The budget changes the result far more than the method. Here's the same example at different monthly budgets.

Going from the minimums to $1,000 saves 26 months and $5,631 of interest. At the minimums, both orders come out the same here, because there's almost nothing extra to aim until the first debt is gone.

How to pay it off faster

The calculator shows the math, and these moves change the inputs.

Ask for a lower rate

A lower rate on your most expensive debt helps right away. Ramit Sethi's I Will Teach You to Be Rich has a script for asking your card company for one.

I Will Teach You to Be Rich

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by Ramit Sethi

I Will Teach You to Be Rich by Ramit Sethi offers a no-BS, practical guide to automating your finances, saving smarter, negotiating bills, and investing without obsessing over every dollar.

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Find extra money each month

Every $100 you add moves your date closer. The side hustle quiz and remote jobs are two places to look for it.

Stop adding new debt

A plan only works if the balances stop growing. Pay cards in full each month while you work through the rest.

Mistakes to avoid

These are the ways a payoff plan stalls.

• Paying only the minimums on every debt
• Spreading extra money across all debts instead of one
• Lowering your payment when a debt is gone, instead of rolling it into the next
• Leaving a card open with new spending on it
• Skipping an emergency fund, so the first surprise goes back on a card

Keep a small cash buffer, then put every extra dollar on your target debt.

Live below your means

The point of being debt-free is the freedom on the other side.

Once the debts are gone, keep paying the same amount into savings. The compound interest calculator shows what that becomes.

Who is the debt payoff calculator for?

It's for anyone with more than one debt and a plan to clear them, and these tools help on the way.

• Loan calculator – for seeing the real cost of a single loan
• Net worth calculator – for watching your net worth rise as debts fall
• Mortgage payoff calculator – for the biggest debt, once the rest are gone
• Side hustle quiz – for finding the extra money that speeds it all up
• Card fees abroad calculator – for not adding fees when you spend abroad

Make your plan here, and come back each month to update the balances.

More money calculators

Your currency and scene come with you to each one.

When the last debt is gone, the compound interest calculator is where the same payment starts working for you.