FIRE Calculator
Enter your spending and savings once and see when you could stop working, under five kinds of FIRE — Lean, Traditional, Fat, Coast and Barista — with Indian inflation, healthcare and tax included.
Five types, one calculation
Lean, Traditional, Fat, Coast and Barista are often described as separate schemes. They all run the same arithmetic — price a year of life, inflate it to the year work stops, and find the corpus that funds it — and differ in just two things: how much is spent, and whether any of it still comes from work.
| Type | Spending it funds | Work after |
|---|---|---|
| Lean FIRE | Essentials only | None |
| Traditional FIRE | The life you have now | None |
| Fat FIRE | Comfortably above today | None |
| Coast FIRE | The life you have now | Keep working, stop investing |
| Barista FIRE | The life you have now | Part-time income |
Who each type tends to suit
People who would rather have the time than the spending, and who can hold a low fixed cost of living without it feeling like deprivation.
Anyone who wants their current standard of living to continue unchanged after they stop working.
High earners, and anyone who would rather work a few more years than spend the next forty counting carefully.
People who want their income back for living on now, or who want to move to lower-paid work without derailing retirement.
People who like some work but not all of it, and who can earn a predictable part-time income for a while.
Today's rupees and retirement rupees
A common slip: ₹1 lakh a month, times twelve, divided by 4%, gives ₹3 crore. But that is today's money, needed years from now — when the same groceries, rent and bills cost ₹2,39,656 a month at 6% inflation. Not a better life; the same one.
So every corpus on this page is shown twice: at your FIRE age, the figure to accumulate, and in today's money, the figure that is easier to picture.
The order the five arrive in
In the worked example below they fall as Coast, Lean, Barista, Traditional, Fat. That order is an output, not a rule: a larger part-time income moves Barista earlier, and a larger corpus already held moves Coast earlier.
Why the 4% rule comes with caveats in India
The 4% figure comes from US research into 30-year retirements. An early retirement in India can run 40 to 50 years, against higher inflation, tax on every equity withdrawal and healthcare that rises faster than everything else — which makes 4% one assumption among several rather than a settled number.
| Rate | Corpus needed | In today's money |
|---|---|---|
| 2.5% | ₹11.50Cr | ₹4.80Cr |
| 3% | ₹9.59Cr | ₹4.00Cr |
| 3.5% | ₹8.22Cr | ₹3.43Cr |
| 4% | ₹7.19Cr | ₹3.00Cr |
| 4.5% | ₹6.39Cr | ₹2.67Cr |
Between 2.5% and 4.5% the requirement nearly doubles — which is why the page shows the whole range rather than one rate.
A worked example
Someone aged 35 spending ₹1,00,000 a month, with ₹1.50Cr invested and ₹1,00,000 a month going in, stopping at 50 and planning to 85. Returns of 10% before and 8% after, inflation at 6%. Illustrative only — not a forecast.
| Type | Corpus needed | In today's money | Reached at |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lean FIRE | ₹4.96Cr | ₹2.07Cr | 41 |
| Traditional FIRE | ₹8.27Cr | ₹3.45Cr | 47 |
| Fat FIRE | ₹16.57Cr | ₹6.91Cr | 57 |
| Coast FIRE | ₹1.98Cr (today) | ₹1.98Cr | 40 |
| Barista FIRE | ₹6.84Cr | ₹2.85Cr | 45 |
How each number was reached
₹12.00L a year becomes ₹28.76L by 50. The rule of thumb at 3.5% gives ₹8.22Cr; spending it down year by year after tax gives ₹8.27Cr.
The same sum on ₹60,000 and ₹2,00,000 a month — amounts entered directly, not a percentage or multiple of anything.
What would have to be invested today, with nothing added, to reach the Traditional target by 50: ₹1.98Cr.
₹50,000 a month of part-time income comes off the bill. The rule gives ₹4.11Cr; year by year it is ₹6.84Cr, as the income stops after 10 years.
What this includes
- Tax on withdrawals as long-term equity gains at 12.5% plus cess, after the ₹1.25L yearly exemption — only the gain is taxed.
- Healthcare rising at its own, faster rate.
- EMIs that run past the FIRE age, until the loan ends.
- One-off goals in the year they fall due, each with its own inflation.
- Anything to leave behind, and part-time income for Barista.
What it leaves out
- The order returns arrive in — one flat return is used throughout. The SWP & Tax Calculator replays a corpus against real Indian market history.
- Splitting the corpus into buckets — the Bucket Strategy tool models that.
- Surcharge, exit loads, expense ratios, TDS and rental income.
- Changes to tax rules over the coming decades.
Everything else here
- SWP & Tax Calculator — How long a corpus lasts under monthly withdrawals — with FIFO capital-gains tax, the ₹1.25 lakh exemption and a replay against real Indian index history.
- Retirement Calculator — Find the corpus your expenses need after inflation and the monthly SIP that builds it, then stress-test that corpus against real Indian market history.
- 3-Bucket Retirement Strategy — Split a retirement corpus into safety, stability and growth buckets, run the refills month by month, and compare it against holding one pot.
- SIP & Lumpsum Calculator — Project what a SIP, a lumpsum or both will be worth, with step-up support — or solve the other way and find the monthly investment a target actually needs.
- SIP + SWP Calculator — Run a SIP and an SWP as one plan: pay in weekly to yearly, draw out on any schedule, and see how long the corpus lasts after capital-gains tax.
- Loan Prepayment Calculator — See what extra money put into a home loan really buys: interest saved, months cut, and whether investing it instead would leave you better off.
- Portfolio Benchmark Comparison — Backtest multi-fund portfolios against NIFTY total-return indices: rolling returns, volatility, drawdown and SIP or lumpsum growth over real NAV history.
- Govt. Scheme Calculators — Calculate PPF, SSY, NSC, KVP, EPF, NPS, APY, PM-SYM, PM-KMY, SCSS and Post Office savings, RD, TD and MIS outcomes with clear India-specific formulas.
- Interest & CAGR Calculator — Compare simple against compound interest on one deposit at any compounding frequency, and find the CAGR between two amounts — by duration or by dates.
- Financial Goal Calculator — Price a home, education, car or any goal at its future cost and see the monthly SIP, lump sum or time it takes — with inflation, step-up and many goals.