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Your personal AI for understanding and tracking your personal finance.
When can you stop saving? Coast FIRE — also written CoastFIRE, CoastFI or Coast FI — is the moment your savings will compound to your full FIRE number, with zero more contributions. Find your number below, then let Richify build the plan to get there.
Last updated 1 September 2026 · Projections use a 7% real (inflation-adjusted) annual return — adjustable below
🇨🇦 In Canada? Use the Coast FIRE calculator for Canada — CAD, with RRSP & TFSA →
🔥 FIRE number
$1,350,000
$4,500/mo × 12 ÷ 4%
⛰️ Coast FIRE number
$177,346
Saved today, this coasts to your goal
You need $57,346 more to Coast FIRE
Once you reach $177K, compounding alone carries you to your goal by age 60.
Your $120K alone projects to $913K by age 60. You need $1.35M. Assumes 7% real return. Not a guarantee.
Three realistic paths to your coast point — pick a date, see the monthly number.
Your personalized accelerator — three ways to coast sooner
Coast at 35
in 5 years
Coast at 33
in 3 years
Coast at 31
in 1 year
Saving $500/month, you'd reach Coast FIRE around age 47
What happens after you reach it? Richify keeps the answer live:
✓ when you hit Coast FIRE — tracked against your real accounts
✓ whether you're still on track as markets move
✓ how different returns shift the date
✓ what a career break or income drop does to it
Free to download · iOS & Android
Which FIRE path fits you?
How much you need saved today so compound growth alone reaches your FIRE target by 65 — at three common FIRE numbers. Assumes a 7% real (inflation-adjusted) return.
Assumes 7% real annual return and retirement at age 65. Use the calculator above for your personalized number.
Coast FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) is the milestone where your invested savings are large enough that compound growth alone — with no additional contributions — will reach your full retirement target by a set age. Once you hit Coast FIRE, you only need to earn enough to cover current living expenses. Your portfolio does the heavy lifting from there.
The term “coasting” comes from coasting downhill — you've done the hard climbing (saving), and momentum (compounding) carries you the rest of the way. You will see it spelled CoastFIRE, CoastFI, Coast FI and coast fire across forums and calculators; they all mean this same milestone, and everything on this page applies to each of them. Coast FIRE is one of five FIRE variants alongside Lean FIRE, Regular FIRE, Fat FIRE, and Barista FIRE.
Coast FIRE Number = Retirement Goal ÷ (1 + r)nThat is the Coast FIRE formula. r is your expected real (inflation-adjusted) annual return — 7% here, the long-run S&P 500 average after inflation, and adjustable above. n is the number of years until you retire. Using a real return matters: your retirement goal is in today's dollars, so discounting it with a nominal return would understate what you need today.
Find your FIRE number: Annual expenses ÷ safe withdrawal rate. At $54K/yr and a 4% SWR → $1,350,000.
Pick your retirement age: How many years until you want to stop working — that's your compounding window.
Divide by compound growth: Apply the formula: $1,350,000 ÷ (1.07)^30 = $177,346 needed today at age 30 retiring at 60, at a 7% real return.
Choose your return assumption — this is the one that decides the answer: The same $1,350,000 target over the same 30 years needs $312,360 at 5% and $177,346 at 7%. Two points of return move your Coast FIRE number by 76%.
Compare to current savings: If you already have that invested, you've hit Coast FIRE. If not, the app builds your monthly plan.
The same target, the same 30 years — three return assumptions. This is why a worked example from an article is not your Coast FIRE number.
5% real return
$312,360
6% real return
$235,049
7% real return
$177,346
A 76% spread from a two-point change in one input — and your retirement age, target and current balance all move it further. The calculator above runs the formula on your own three numbers.
No. CoastFIRE, CoastFI, Coast FI and Coast FIRE are the same milestone written four ways, and the calculator above answers all of them. The spelling drifted because the community shortens “Financial Independence, Retire Early” to both FIRE and FI, and closes the space when typing it quickly.
One distinction is worth keeping, though, and it is not about spelling. Coast FI is sometimes used for the version where you stop contributing but keep working to cover today's expenses, while Barista FIRE assumes part-time work that covers only part of them. Your CoastFIRE number is the same either way — what changes is how you fund the years between coasting and retirement.
You are Coast FIRE the moment your invested balance is at or above your full FIRE number discounted back to today. Three steps: divide your retirement spending by your safe withdrawal rate to get the full number, divide that by (1 + real return)years to retirement to get your Coast number, then compare it to what you actually have invested. If you are above the line you can stop contributing entirely; if you are below it, the gap is what you still need — not the full target.
The part almost every Coast FIRE calculator leaves out is what that line looks like against real balances. Below, the Coast FIRE number for a $1.5M target at 7% real returns and retirement at 65, set beside the median 401(k) balance in each age band from How America Saves 2026 (25th edition), measured at 31 December 2025.
The honest reading: the typical 401(k) participant is nowhere near Coast FIRE at any age, sitting between 3% and 17% of the way there. The share peaks in the late thirties and early forties and then falls back, because in the last two decades before retirement the Coast number climbs faster than balances do — each year you do not hit it, one year of compounding is taken off the table and the target rises. That is the argument for reaching it early: the same $1.5M target costs $140,494 at 30 and $1,069,479 at 60.
Read these balances carefully. They are Vanguard defined-contribution participants, not all Americans: people with no workplace plan are absent entirely, which pushes the figures up, while a balance is counted per plan, so old 401(k)s at other providers and any IRA are missing, which pushes them down. Treat them as a reference point rather than a target, and compare your own total invested balance to the Coast column. Full method and caveats on average 401(k) balance by age and average net worth by age.
This calculator excludes it by default, which is the conservative choice. Counting it lowers your number a lot: the average retired-worker benefit was $2,084.40 a month in June 2026 — about $25,000 a year — and at a 4% withdrawal rate that income is equivalent to roughly $625,000 of portfolio you would otherwise have to build. On a $1.5M target, that is a large fraction of the job done by something you are not saving for.
Three things to weigh before you lean on it. Claiming at 62 permanently reduces the benefit and waiting until 70 increases it, so the figure you count is a decision, not a given. The 2026 Social Security Trustees Report projects the retirement trust fund is depleted in 2032, after which payroll-tax income would cover about 78% of scheduled benefits unless Congress acts — current-law behaviour, not a proposal, and Congress has historically acted. And the benefit is indexed to CPI-W, which is not the same as your own spending.
The practical answer is to run it both ways: once ignoring Social Security, once counting a conservative share of it, and treat the difference as margin of safety rather than as savings. You can size the downside on the Social Security cut calculator.
Sources: SSA Monthly Statistical Snapshot, June 2026 (average retired-worker benefit); 2026 Social Security Trustees Report, released 9 June 2026 (OASI depletion 2032, ~78% payable). General information, not financial advice. Section added 1 September 2026.
Coast FIRE means you've saved enough in your retirement accounts that, even if you never contribute another dollar, compound growth alone will carry your portfolio to your full FIRE number by your traditional retirement age (typically 60-67). Once you hit Coast FIRE, you only need to earn enough to cover current living expenses — no more saving required.
Coast FIRE number = Full FIRE number ÷ (1 + real return rate)^(years until retirement). Example: FIRE target $1.5M, retiring in 30 years at 7% real return → $1,500,000 ÷ (1.07)^30 = $197,000. If you have $197,000 saved today, it will grow to $1.5M by retirement without another contribution. The formula is simple; the answer is not portable, because it is dominated by the return you assume. That same $1.5M target over the same 30 years needs $347,000 at a 5% real return instead of $197,000 at 7% — a 76% swing from one assumption, before your own retirement age, target and current balance move it again. Take the method from any article, but run the three numbers yourself.
Your Coast FIRE number is the minimum portfolio size needed today so that compound interest alone reaches your full FIRE target by retirement — with zero additional savings. It shrinks the longer you have until retirement: at 7% real returns, $100K at age 25 becomes $1.5M by 65. Your Coast FIRE number rises sharply as you get closer to retirement.
Full FIRE means your portfolio is large enough to support your expenses indefinitely right now. Coast FIRE means your portfolio will grow to that point on its own by a future date. If your FIRE number is $1.5M at age 60 and your investments will compound to $1.5M by then without additional contributions, you've hit Coast FIRE — even if your current portfolio is only $400K.
A common assumption is 7% real (inflation-adjusted) return for a US stock index fund. This is based on historical S&P 500 returns minus inflation. Conservative estimates use 5-6%. The actual return you achieve will vary — this calculator shows projections, not guarantees. Lower assumed returns mean you need more saved to reach Coast FIRE.
Yes — any tax-advantaged retirement account (401k, IRA, Roth IRA) counts toward your Coast FIRE number. The key insight is that the money already saved will compound regardless of further contributions. Coast FIRE lets you shift to lower-stress, lower-paying work while your retirement funds grow on autopilot.
Coast FIRE means your saved investments will compound to your full FIRE target without more contributions — you just need to cover current expenses from income. Barista FIRE means you work a low-stress part-time job (like a barista) whose income plus employer benefits partially covers current expenses, while your portfolio also grows. Both eliminate the need to save aggressively; Barista FIRE often includes employer health insurance as a key benefit.
Yes — especially for those who start investing early. Saving $100K by age 25 and investing in a broad index fund at 7% real return reaches $1.5M by age 65 without another contribution. The challenge is saving the initial Coast number, not the decades of growth. Most people can reach Coast FIRE in their 30s or early 40s with consistent early saving.
After hitting Coast FIRE you can: (1) stop contributing to retirement and spend all income on current lifestyle, (2) take a lower-paying but more fulfilling job since savings pressure is gone, (3) work part-time (Barista FIRE style), or (4) keep contributing and reach full FIRE earlier. Many Coast FIRE achievers reduce hours or change careers rather than stop working entirely.
All three refer to the same idea, and you'll see each used in the FIRE community. Coast FIRE is the most common written form; CoastFIRE (one word) is frequent in forum and social posts; Coast FI drops the 'RE' (retire early) because many people who reach it keep working by choice rather than retiring. FIRE stands for Financial Independence, Retire Early, so Coast FI and Coast FIRE describe the same milestone — the point where your existing investments will compound to your retirement target with no further contributions. This calculator works the same whichever term you searched for.
Three checks. (1) Work out your full FIRE number: annual expenses in retirement divided by your safe withdrawal rate — $60,000 a year at 4% is $1,500,000. (2) Discount it back to today: divide by (1 + real return)^years until retirement. (3) Compare that to what you have invested. If your invested balance is equal to or above the discounted figure, you are Coast FIRE: you can stop contributing entirely and still land on target, provided returns hold. If you are below it, you are not there yet, and the gap — not the total — is what you still need to save.
It depends on the gap, not on your total target, which is why Coast FIRE usually arrives far sooner than people expect. Your Coast FIRE number also falls every year you keep working, because there is one less year of compounding to buy. Someone aged 30 with $60,000 invested and a $1.5M target at 65 needs about $140,000 today — but if they keep saving $1,500 a month, their balance and their shrinking Coast number converge in roughly four years rather than the fifty-plus it would take to save $1.5M outright.
Most Coast FIRE calculators, including this one by default, exclude it — that is the conservative choice. Counting it lowers your number materially: the average retired-worker benefit was $2,084.40 a month in June 2026 (SSA Monthly Statistical Snapshot), about $25,000 a year, which at a 4% withdrawal rate is equivalent to roughly $625,000 of portfolio you would otherwise need. Three cautions before you lean on it: claiming at 62 permanently reduces the benefit while waiting to 70 increases it; the 2026 Social Security Trustees Report projects the retirement trust fund depletes in 2032, after which scheduled benefits would be about 78% payable unless Congress acts; and the benefit is indexed to CPI-W, not to your own spending. A reasonable middle path is to run the calculator twice — once ignoring Social Security, once counting a conservative share of it — and treat the difference as your margin of safety.
Yes, and for most people those two accounts are the whole plan. For 2026 the 401(k) elective deferral limit is $24,500, with an $8,000 catch-up from age 50 and an enhanced $11,250 catch-up at ages 60 to 63; the IRA limit is $7,500, with a $1,100 catch-up at 50 and over. Employer matching sits on top of the elective deferral limit. What matters for Coast FIRE is the balance already invested rather than the contribution rate, so hitting the Coast number early and then dropping to the match is a common pattern. Figures are the IRS 2026 limits; check irs.gov before relying on them for a contribution decision.
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