A starting balance plus regular deposits, compounding. The year-by-year table shows where the interest starts to matter, which is usually later and more suddenly than people expect.
Add a goal and the tool runs the other way too: the deposit needed to land on that amount by the end of your term, and how long your current deposit takes to get there. Neither answer is fudged — a goal your starting balance already covers needs nothing and no time, and a goal that no deposit ever reaches says so rather than returning a number.
At the end of each period. Depositing at the start of the period instead earns one extra period of interest on every deposit, which is a real difference rather than a rounding one — over long terms it adds up. If your bank credits deposits at the start, the figure here is slightly conservative.
At the same frequency as your deposits. If you save monthly, interest compounds monthly. A bank that compounds quarterly while you deposit monthly will differ a little from this, so treat the figure as close rather than exact.
It turns on two answers running the other way: the deposit you would need to land on that amount by the end of your term, and how long the deposit you already entered takes to get there. Leave it blank and the tool just projects forward.
Because the exact solution lands mid-period — 79.3 deposits, in one example. You cannot make three tenths of a deposit, so the 79th leaves you short and the 80th is the one that clears the goal. Rounding down would tell you that you had arrived on a day you had not.
Close, but not the same. This assumes a fixed rate you were quoted, like a time deposit. The Investment Calculator takes an expected return you are assuming rather than being promised, lets the contribution rise each year, and can discount the result for inflation.
i is the rate per deposit period, n the number of deposits.
The exact solve for a ₱500,000 goal is 79.3 deposits. The tool reports 80, because the 79th still leaves you ₱2,246 short.
Deposits are assumed at the end of each period, with interest compounding at the deposit frequency. A bank's own crediting and compounding rules may differ. Nothing you type here is sent to our servers — the calculation runs entirely in your browser.
