Debt & Loans
Debt Payoff Calculator
Balance, rate, payment — out come months to debt-free, total interest, and an actual calendar date. Then tap +$50 and watch the line drop.
Fixed APR, monthly compounding, payment applied at month-end, no new charges. Dates count from July 2026.
How it works
The simulation runs your balance the way the card actually runs it: each month, interest lands first — one-twelfth of the APR on whatever you still owe — and then your payment comes out. Whatever's left rolls into the next month. The final month is a partial payment: you pay what remains, not the full amount, and the calculator counts it honestly. At the defaults — $594 at 19.99% APR, $150 a month — that's five payments, $26 of interest, and a debt-free date of Dec 2026.
The trap hides in that first step. If your payment is at or below the month's interest, the balance never falls — you're renting the debt, not repaying it. When your inputs cross that line, this calculator says so and prints the exact monthly-interest figure you'd need to clear, instead of drawing you a fifty-year fantasy curve.
The + $50/mo chip answers the most useful follow-up question there is: what would a little more do? The dashed green line replays the payoff at your payment plus $50 and prints months sooner and interest saved — computed from your numbers, not a slogan. One honest limit: this page simulates a single balance. If you're carrying several, the order you attack them matters — highest APR first (avalanche) minimizes total interest; smallest balance first (snowball) gets you wins sooner. ClariFi's debt planner orders the whole list either way and tracks the plan as you go.
The formula
each month: balance ← balance × (1 + APR/1200) ← interest lands first
balance ← balance − min(payment, balance)
months to debt-free = number of months until balance hits $0
total interest = everything paid − starting balance
Example: $594 at 19.99% APR, $150/mo → 5 mo · $26 interest · Dec 2026
Honest assumptions
- Fixed APR, compounded monthly, with the payment applied at month-end — after that month's interest.
- No new purchases — the simulation pays down a frozen balance. Keep swiping and every number on this page moves against you.
- The final payment is partial: you pay what's left, not the full monthly amount.
- Payoff dates count forward from July 2026. This page does arithmetic — a starting point, not a plan, and not advice.
Questions people ask
Why does the minimum payment barely move my balance?
Because interest is taken out of it first. On the default $594 at 19.99% APR, about $10 of the first $150 payment is interest — manageable. But on a $5,000 balance at the same rate, interest eats roughly $83 a month, and a minimum payment near that line is mostly rent on the debt. Drop the payment to the interest line or below and this calculator warns you outright: the balance never clears.
Avalanche or snowball — which order should I pay debts in?
Avalanche attacks the highest APR first and always wins on total interest — it's the mathematically cheapest order. Snowball attacks the smallest balance first, which costs a bit more but delivers early wins that keep a lot of people going. With a single balance, like this page simulates, the two are identical; with several, the ordering is the whole game — ClariFi's debt planner runs your list either way and tracks the plan.
Does an extra $50 a month really matter?
Tap the chip and read the answer for your own numbers — it prints exactly how many months sooner and how much interest you'd save. As a rule, the effect grows with balance and APR: on a small balance like the default $594 it mostly buys speed, while on a multi-thousand-dollar balance at card rates it buys real money. The point of the chip is that you never have to take that on faith.
Does this include new purchases on the card?
No — the simulation freezes the balance on day one, and that's disclosed right under the results. If you're still spending on the card, your real payoff runs longer than this page shows. That's not a flaw to hide; it's why "stop adding to it" is step one of every payoff plan ever written.
Related calculators
ClariFi makes tools, not advice. Nothing on this page is a recommendation to buy, sell, or sign anything.
In the app
ClariFi runs this math on your real accounts.
Connect your bank once and the numbers on this page compute themselves — live, private, every day. Free in TestFlight early access.
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