Retirement calculators can be useful tools to help you determine if you are on track with saving for retirement. Based on the data derived, you can adjust your retirement plans by altering how much you save or your expected retirement date. Before relying on the results of a single calculator, be aware that differences exist. After using 10 different retirement calculators, our suggestion is to look at more than one.

All retirement calculators ask how much you have saved and what your annual income is. This helps to establish baseline facts for calculating future wealth.

Many retirement calculators graphically show how much you have saved and may show whether, based on current projections, a retirement shortfall is expected. A retirement shortfall is the difference between the total estimated amount you will need for retirement and what you have saved.

Some retirement calculators consider other factors, such as Social Security benefits and spousal information. It should be noted that not all calculators provide options to specify future Social Security benefits in their answers. Those looking to obtain the most accurate information should use estimated Social Security benefit information based on their earnings record. (Check for your information on the Social Security Administration’s website at www.ssa.gov/myaccount.) The same can be said for a spouse’s benefits.

Retirement calculators can be a powerful tool to evaluate whether you are on schedule to retire. Nevertheless, it’s helpful to understand how they differ from one another. Not all offer the same features. Some offer a more in-depth look at one’s potential retirement income, while others offer a broader view. Investors should seek out and use the ones that best fit their profile and desires for customization.

Differences in Retirement Calculators

While all retirement calculators serve the same purpose, a variety of calculators exist, and they do not universally consider the same factors or ask for the same information. It is important to be aware of these differences before using one.

A common and basic example of the key differences in retirement calculators pertains to spouses. While many calculators are meant to focus on the individual, including the spouse’s retirement savings and Social Security benefits helps to paint a clearer and more accurate picture. AARP’s retirement calculator does a good job of this, as it breaks down spousal Social Security benefits and factors in both spousal income and savings. This can help couples get a better understanding of how much they need to retire.

A few retirement calculators provide benchmark percentages of suggested spending in retirement. This varied from calculator to calculator. Calculators from Kiplinger, Merrill, NerdWallet, Charles Schwab and Vanguard all proposed suggested spending percentages ranging from 70% to 85% of current spending. Depending on the suggested percentage or your own percentage used, the results regarding how prepared you are for retirement will differ.

Some calculators dive into even deeper detail. AARP, Fidelity and TD Ameritrade all break down retirement income by the source, displaying whether savings or Social Security benefits are responsible for most income in retirement. This helps you see how much of your own savings will cover your spending in retirement versus Social Security benefits and so forth. It also conveys whether your current retirement income goal will be sufficient to cover all projected expenses. Ideally, an individual’s projected income in retirement should match or exceed projected expenses. This determination depends on how realistic the spending percentage used by the retirement calculator is. Vanguard and TD Ameritrade go a step further by calculating monthly income and expenses using the data given. Bankrate also has a similar monthly income and expense feature.

Lastly, while all the retirement calculators we looked at factored Social Security benefits into their calculations, how they handled them varied. Bankrate, Fidelity, Merrill, TD Ameritrade, T. Rowe Price and Vanguard estimated future Social Security benefits. Kiplinger and NerdWallet asked for benefits to be entered in manually. AARP and Schwab give you the option to either enter in your own estimated benefits or allow their calculators to estimate your benefits (Figure 1).

When entering Social Security manually, it wasn’t intuitive as to whether benefits should be in current or future dollar amounts. We are able to determine that AARP, for instance, uses current dollar amounts by looking at what it estimates benefits to be. NerdWallet appeared to take estimated monthly Social Security benefits in today’s dollars, but, again, it wasn’t clear.

Neither Fidelity’s, Schwab’s nor Vanguard’s retirement calculator asked about spouses. This omission reduces the expected retirement income and expenses for married couples.

T. Rowe Price’s retirement calculator does not tell you how much you have saved or how much retirement income you will have. Rather, it gives you the probability of not outliving your money given projected expenses.

Table 1 summarizes the features of the 10 retirement calculators we tested.

TABLE 1. Overview of the 10 Retirement Calculators We Tested

Personas Used for Comparing the 10 Retirement Calculators

We used three different personas in the retirement calculators to determine retirement preparedness. Each persona represented a different life stage: early in career, mid-career and nearing retirement. The target retirement age was 67.

We relied on a few sources for determining which numbers to assign to each persona. Vanguard’s “How America Saves (2021)” provided data on contribution levels, employer matching amounts and account balances, among other data. The Federal Reserve’s 2019 retirement savings data gave us information on savings balances. An annual survey of AAII membership that we conduct provided a snapshot of income and portfolio balances for affluent investors near and in retirement. Social Security benefits, when asked to be entered, were based on estimates from the Social Security Administration.

All retirement savings were calculated as being held in a 401(k) plan account. This was done to make it easier to compare results across calculators. An employer match of 2.5% of income was used in all cases. All personas were listed as residing in and planning to spend retirement in Texas for those calculators that specifically asked about location. Texas was chosen because it does not have a state income tax.

The early-career persona uses a 25-year-old single woman. Her salary is $40,000 per year. She saves 5% of her salary and has accumulated $7,000 in retirement savings so far. She uses an aggressive allocation, given her age.

The mid-career persona uses a 45-year-old married couple. This is a one-income couple to provide comparisons across calculators. The working spouse earns $110,000 per year and saves 9% of their income. The couple’s retirement savings total $160,000. An aggressive allocation is used.

The near-retirement persona uses a 65-year-old married couple. This is a one-income couple to provide comparisons across calculators. The working spouse earns $127,000 per year and saves 20% of their income. The couple’s retirement savings total $1.5 million. A moderate allocation is used.

Retirement Calculator Results

When comparing the results of the retirement calculators, the key factors to look at are the total amount of savings needed to retire and the total amount of projected savings at retirement based on the savings plan for each persona. These amounts can then be used to calculate the shortfall or surplus in savings. However, not every calculator provided these figures. The retirement calculators that did not include these figures provided figures on monthly income and expenses instead, which then were used to determine if there was a shortfall. Additionally, some of the calculators further broke down retirement income to show whether most of the income was from savings or Social Security.

Early-Career Investor

Fidelity and Schwab were the only retirement calculators that projected a shortfall in savings for our early-career persona. Fidelity anticipated that $3,270 in monthly income would be available but projected that the early-career persona would have monthly retirement expenses of $3,913. Schwab’s calculator estimated the total amount needed to retire to be $1.17 million, while the total amount saved by retirement would only be $1.0 million. The AARP and Vanguard calculators estimated that the majority of income in retirement would come from Social Security, while Bankrate, Fidelity and TD Ameritrade all estimated that the majority of income would come from savings.

Among the remaining retirement calculators that did not predict a shortfall in savings, there was a wide range of results. The Merrill calculator projected the most savings at the time of retirement at $2.95 million. Merrill anticipated the early-career persona to need $1.61 million at retirement. Bankrate followed with expected savings of $1.61 million and annual income of $76,572 ($6,381 per month) at retirement. The TD Ameritrade calculator gave annual data for post-retirement income ($56,208), investment earnings ($88,274) and spending ($73,854).

The AARP and Vanguard retirement calculators produced much more conservative figures than the rest of the calculators. AARP anticipates that the early-career persona will have $830,000 saved at retirement. Additionally, AARP predicts that only $487,000 is needed to retire. Vanguard’s calculator produced the lowest amount of savings at retirement of $609,000. Despite this, Vanguard still did not project a shortfall in savings. Monthly income was projected at $10,819 while expenses were only $2,833. The Kiplinger retirement calculator was unable to be used for the early-career persona because the maximum number of years until retirement that it allows is 30.

Mid-Career Investor

The mid-career persona produced a wide range of results, with half of the calculators projecting a shortfall in savings. Those that projected a shortfall in savings were Fidelity, Kiplinger, Merrill and Schwab. Kiplinger projected by far the biggest shortfall among the calculators with a nest egg goal of nearly $200,000 more than the projected value of future savings ($1.28 million versus $1.08 million). The calculator with the smallest projected shortfall in savings was Merrill. Merrill projected a shortfall of approximately $9,000. Merrill’s retirement calculator also had the highest projected expenses, with a retirement nest egg target size of $2.98 million.

Fidelity’s projected shortfall was based on monthly expenditures and savings. This retirement calculator forecast monthly expenses of $6,924 and monthly income of $5,177.

NerdWallet had the second-highest projected savings and the absolute lowest needed retirement savings. Its retirement calculator estimated that the married couple used in this persona would have $1.99 million saved but would only need $360,000 to cover expenses. This was due to the inclusion of Social Security benefits. When we excluded Social Security, the retirement calculator projected a $400,000 shortfall. It said the persona needed $2.39 million saved.

AARP, Bankrate, TD Ameritrade, T. Rowe Price and Vanguard said the 45-year-old couple used in this persona would have more than they needed at retirement. The margin of error was close in some cases. AARP projected savings of $1.26 million and a needed nest egg of $1.23 million. Vanguard projected monthly retirement income of $8,145 and monthly expenses of $7,792.

Near-Retirement Investor

Since this was the most affluent persona we used, it should not be surprising to find that most of the retirement calculators said this couple was on track to meet their retirement goals.

Only one retirement calculator projected a shortfall: Merrill. Not surprisingly, it also had the highest estimate of how much would be needed for retirement. Merrill projected that $2.32 million will be needed. This is above the $2.22 million the retirement calculator predicted would be available. Merrill also projected monthly expenditures of nearly $9,000.

Vanguard matched Merrill’s spending projection. The only retirement calculator with a higher projected monthly expenditure was Bankrate, with estimated monthly spending of just under $9,200.

The percentage estimate for how much will be spent in retirement relative to current income makes a difference. Merrill’s retirement calculator defaults to 85% of current income. Vanguard’s retirement calculator bases spending on an inflation-adjusted 4% of the portfolio’s balance at the start of retirement. This is why Vanguard projects a lower balance ($1.68 million) at the start of retirement than Merrill does but does not expect the retired couple to outlive their savings.

Kiplinger projected the highest starting balance at $2.42 million. The reason is because Kiplinger’s retirement calculator only allows retirement dates to be specified in five-year increments. Thus, the retired couple used in this persona had an assumed retirement date of 70 instead of age 67, as was used in all other calculators.

TD Ameritrade’s retirement calculator projected the second-lowest starting balance at retirement with an estimate of just under $1.74 billion. In terms of the total amount needed to be saved by retirement, the AARP and NerdWallet calculators were essentially tied at approximately $770,000 each.

Which Retirement Calculator Should You Use?

We found a surprising number of differences in both the inputs each retirement calculator requested and the output they provided. As we’ve explained, differences exist in terms of whether such things as Social Security benefits can be entered (it’s best if you can enter an estimate based on your earnings record) and whether spouses are considered.

All but T. Rowe Price listed how much can be expected (Figure 2). Five retirement calculators gave a retirement savings balance target: AARP, Kiplinger, Merrill, NerdWallet and Schwab. Monthly income and expenses were available through some, but we also found ourselves doing some math outside of the calculators. TD Ameritrade, for example, displayed a table showing post-retirement income and investment earnings broken out separately without clear explanations.

Given these differences, we suggest looking at more than one calculator. We also suggest considering what type of information you desire. Investors who are comfortable using spreadsheets may find it more helpful to do their own calculations rather than relying on a retirement calculator.

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