Monthly budget calculator
Enter what comes in and what goes out. Amounts can be weekly, monthly, quarterly or annual, and everything is converted to a monthly figure so it can be compared honestly. Leave anything blank that does not apply.
Your money
Coming in
£0Home
£0Living
£0Commitments
£0Personal
£0Your month
Left over each month
£0.00
Enter your income and spending to see the result.
How this is worked out
Everything is converted to a monthly equivalent, then spending is subtracted from income. The only subtlety is in the conversion. A weekly amount is multiplied by 52 and divided by 12, not multiplied by 4, because a year contains slightly more than 48 weeks. Multiplying by 4 understates weekly costs by about eight per cent, which over a year is a month's worth of spending that never appears in the budget.
weekly × 52 ÷ 12
fortnightly × 26 ÷ 12
four-weekly × 13 ÷ 12
quarterly ÷ 3
yearly ÷ 12
balance = income − spending
Getting a truthful answer
The common mistake is entering what you intend to spend rather than what you do spend. Three months of bank statements will give you better numbers than memory, particularly for food, transport and anything bought online.
Annual costs are the other blind spot. Car insurance, MOT and servicing, Christmas, birthdays, holidays, dentistry, vet bills and boiler servicing rarely appear in a monthly budget, yet they arrive every year without fail. Enter them as yearly amounts and let the calculator spread them, otherwise your budget will balance on paper and fail in practice.
What to do with a surplus
A surplus that stays in a current account tends to get spent. Moving it out on payday, whether into savings, an emergency fund or an overpayment, is what turns it into something. Common priorities are a small emergency buffer first, then expensive debt, then longer-term saving, though the right order depends on your circumstances.
If the month comes up short
A shortfall means something is filling the gap, usually savings or borrowing, and neither lasts indefinitely. Acting early keeps more options open, and it is a far more common position than people assume.
Two things are worth doing before anything drastic. Check whether you are claiming everything you are entitled to, since a large amount of benefit support goes unclaimed every year and the free advisers below can check this for you in one conversation. And speak to a debt adviser before taking on new borrowing to cover the gap, because they may see options that are cheaper or that you did not know existed.
These conversations are free, confidential and non-judgemental. The advisers have this conversation many times a day and will not be shocked by your situation.
What this assumes
Income is treated as regular and net of tax, which does not describe self-employed or commission-based earnings well. If your income varies, budgeting on your lowest realistic month is safer than on the average. Nothing here accounts for inflation, and no figures are stored between visits.