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SIP Calculator

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  • Projected value - at the end of the period, before tax
  • Total invested - the money you actually put in
  • Estimated returns - growth on top of your contributions
  • Growth multiple - what every rupee invested becomes

Invested, - Returns, -

Year by year
Year Invested that year Invested so far Value at year end

Put a fixed amount into a fund every month and see what it could be worth, split into the part you paid in and the part that is growth. There is a step-up option, because most people raise their instalment every year with their salary, and a lump sum mode for a single investment. The year by year table is the useful part: it shows the years where nothing much seems to happen and the later ones where the returns overtake the contributions.

About this SIP calculator

A systematic investment plan is simply a standing instruction: the same amount leaves your bank on the same day every month and buys units in a fund. The appeal is not that it beats investing a lump sum, it is that it removes the decision. You never have to judge whether this is a good week to buy, and you keep buying when prices fall, which is when most people stop.

The arithmetic here treats each instalment as going in at the start of its month and compounding monthly from there, which is the convention every fund house calculator uses, so the figure should line up with theirs. The step-up option raises the monthly amount by your chosen percentage at the start of each year. That one setting usually changes the result more than any plausible change to the return you assume, which is the honest argument for raising your instalment with your salary.

This is a projection, not a forecast. It assumes a constant return, and no real fund delivers one. An equity fund that averages 12 percent over fifteen years will have had years at plus 30 and years at minus 20, and the order those years arrive in changes the answer. Treat the number as a rough sense of scale and a way to compare two plans against each other, never as an amount you can count on. Returns shown here are also before any tax, expense ratio or exit load. If you are weighing a monthly investment against a monthly repayment, the EMI calculator puts the other side of that decision in the same terms.

How to calculate SIP returns

  1. Enter the monthly investment you can keep up without stopping. Consistency matters more than the size of the instalment.
  2. Set an expected return. Around 10 to 12 percent is the usual long run assumption for an Indian equity fund, 7 to 8 for a hybrid or debt fund. Lower it and see how much the projection moves: that gap is your margin of error.
  3. Choose the period in years. Compounding does most of its work late, so the difference between 10 years and 20 is far more than double.
  4. Add a step-up if you plan to raise the instalment each year. Ten percent matches a typical annual increment.
  5. Switch to Lump sum for a single investment compounded yearly instead.
  6. Read the split bar. The point at which returns overtake contributions is the single most useful thing on this page.

Common questions about SIP

How is the SIP maturity value calculated?
With the future value of an annuity due: the amount times ((1 plus i) to the power n, minus 1), divided by i, times (1 plus i), where i is the yearly return divided by 1200 and n is the number of months. Each instalment is treated as going in at the start of its month, so the last one still earns a month of growth. When the return is 0 the formula would divide by zero, so that case is handled separately and the answer is just the amount times the number of months.

What return should I assume?
Lower than the number in the advertisement. Indian equity indices have returned somewhere around 11 to 13 percent a year over long periods, but a fund's past three year return is a terrible guide to its next three. A practical approach is to run the calculation twice, once at 12 percent and once at 8, and plan against the lower figure. If the plan only works at the higher one, it is not a plan.

What does a step-up SIP actually do?
It raises your monthly instalment by a set percentage every year, so your investing grows with your income instead of staying frozen at whatever you could afford when you started. Try 10000 a month for 20 years with no step-up, then with 10 percent: the projected value roughly doubles, because the larger instalments in the later years still get years of compounding. It is the highest leverage setting on this page and it costs nothing today.

Is SIP better than a lump sum?
Not mathematically. If markets generally rise, money invested earlier compounds longer, so a lump sum invested at the start beats the same total drip fed in over years. What a SIP does is remove the timing risk and the behaviour problem: you are not betting everything on one day's price, and you keep buying through a fall. For most people investing out of a salary the question does not arise, because the money arrives monthly anyway.

Will I really get this amount?
No, and any calculator that implies otherwise is misleading you. This assumes a constant return every single month, which no market provides. Real returns arrive in a jagged order, and a bad run near the end hurts far more than a bad run at the start because there is more money exposed to it. The figure is useful for comparing plans and for getting the order of magnitude right, not as a promise. It also ignores tax, the fund's expense ratio and any exit load.

Are my figures sent anywhere?
No. The whole calculation is JavaScript running on this page, so the amount, the rate and the period stay on your own device. Nothing is uploaded, logged or saved, and the page keeps working with your connection switched off.

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