Coast FIRE Calculator
How Much Do You Need Invested Today to Stop Contributing and Still Retire?
Coast FIRE is the point where your current investments are large enough that compound growth alone can carry your portfolio to your full retirement target by your chosen age — even if you stop making new contributions.
In plain terms, Coast FIRE means your portfolio has reached escape velocity. You still need enough income to cover your current lifestyle, but you no longer need to keep aggressively investing for traditional retirement if your assumptions hold.
Answers a different question: do you already have enough that compound growth alone can carry you to retirement without another dollar contributed?
Your Coast FIRE status
You need $759,941 invested by age 40 for your portfolio to coast to retirement without new contributions. At your current pace, you could reach it in 16 years.
Your fastest path to Coast FIRE
You're currently projected to reach your goal in 16 yrs. Here are the changes that would reduce your coast timeline the most.
Moving to a lower-cost location reduces your living costs and the retirement target your portfolio needs to support.
1. Move to the lower-cost location
6 yrs soonerLower geographic costs can shorten the path materially.
2. Raise savings rate to 28%
3 yrs soonerMore of your income working for you sooner.
3. Lower spending by 10%
2 yrs soonerA smaller target means compounding has less ground to cover.
These are planning estimates, not guarantees. Small changes in return assumptions, taxes, and future spending can materially change the result.
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How Coast FIRE actually works
Coast FIRE is based on present value. Instead of asking how much you need at retirement, it asks how much you need invested today so that compounding alone grows your portfolio to that future target.
The basic idea is: full future FIRE target ÷ expected compounded growth over the years remaining until retirement = Coast FIRE number today. Once your portfolio reaches that number, additional contributions become optional rather than required under the model.
What changes your Coast FIRE number most
Years until retirement
The more time compounding has to work, the smaller the Coast FIRE number you need today.
Investment return assumption
Small changes in expected return can shift the Coast FIRE number materially because the model depends heavily on long-term compounding.
Full FIRE target
Your Coast FIRE number depends on the full retirement number you eventually need, so higher expected retirement spending raises the target.
Living costs today
Once you hit Coast FIRE, you still need enough earned income to cover your current life until retirement actually begins.
Who Coast FIRE is usually best for
Coast FIRE is often attractive for people who want to reduce work pressure before reaching full traditional FIRE. It can be a strong fit for someone who wants flexibility, career optionality, or the ability to shift into lower-stress work while still letting investments compound in the background.
It is usually most useful for people who already have a meaningful investment base and enough time left before retirement for compounding to matter.
What this calculator includes — and what it does not
Included
- Coast FIRE milestone logic
- Portfolio growth projection
- Return-based target modeling
- Comparison against a future FIRE target
Not fully modeled
- Sequence-of-returns risk in detail
- Changing tax treatment over decades
- Every market-cycle scenario
- Your future spending changes with perfect precision
This tool is built for planning direction, not certainty. Coast FIRE is highly sensitive to long-term assumptions, so the output is most useful as a scenario-planning estimate.