Credit Card Payoff Calculator

Your minimum payment shrinks as the balance falls, which is why paying it clears the card so slowly. This models that properly and shows the same comparison your statement is legally required to print.

Your issuer’s minimum payment rule — it is stated in your cardholder agreement, and the two common rules give very different answers.

Minimum payment warning — $5,000 at 22.8% APR
If you payMonthlyClear inTotal cost
Only the minimum$145.00 falling19 yr 4 mo$13,414
To clear in 3 years$193.033 years$6,949
Your payment$250.002 yr 2 mo$6,350
SAVED BY PAYING IT OFF IN 3 YEARS INSTEAD
$6,465

Paying only the minimum takes 19 yr 4 mo because the payment shrinks with the balance. The first payment is $145.00, of which $95.00 is interest — so only $50.00 comes off what you owe.

Figures assume no new spending and no fees, the same assumption Regulation Z sets for the box on your statement. Paying several cards at once? Use the debt payoff calculator to compare the avalanche and snowball orderings.

About the Credit Card Payoff Calculator

There is a box on every US credit card statement that most people never read. It tells you how many years you will be paying if you only ever send the minimum, and what you would have to pay instead to be clear in three years. Card issuers are required to print it by the Credit CARD Act of 2009, and the figures in it are usually startling. This calculator is that box, made interactive, with your own balance and rate. What makes credit cards different from every other debt is that the minimum payment is not a fixed amount. It is a formula tied to your balance, so as the balance falls the minimum falls with it, and the payoff stretches out. Almost every other calculator on the web quietly assumes you pay the same amount every month, which is not how a minimum works and produces an answer that is far too optimistic. This one models the decline properly, and it lets you pick which of the two minimum payment rules your issuer actually uses, because the difference between them can be sixty years on the same card.

Mathematical Formula & Logic

Each month is simulated in two steps, in this order. Interest is charged on the balance you carried into the month, before your payment lands. 1. Interest for the month i = B x (APR / 100) / 12 Where: - i = interest added this month - B = balance carried into the month - APR = the purchase annual percentage rate on the card 2. The payment This is where credit cards differ from loans, because two different minimum payment rules are in common use and they behave very differently. Rule A - percent of balance plus interest payment = max(floor, p x B + i) The percentage is taken from the principal and the month's interest is added on top. Your balance therefore falls by the full percentage p every single month, no matter how high the APR is. Most large US issuers use a rule of this shape, typically 1% plus interest and fees, with a floor around $25 to $40. Rule B - flat percent of the whole balance payment = max(floor, p x (B + i)) The percentage is taken from the entire statement balance, interest included. Your balance now falls by only (p - monthly rate), because the interest is coming out of the same slice. On a card at 22.8% APR the monthly rate is 1.9%, so a 2% minimum retires just 0.1% of the balance a month. This is the arithmetic behind the horror stories. 3. The three-year payment The figure the CARD Act requires on your statement is a straightforward annuity payment: P = B x r / (1 - (1 + r)^-36) Where: - P = the fixed monthly payment that clears the balance in exactly 36 months - r = the monthly rate, APR / 100 / 12 - B = the current balance At a zero rate this degenerates to B / 36. A payment only clears the card if it exceeds the interest accruing that month. Below that threshold the balance grows forever, and this calculator says so rather than printing a date.

Step-by-Step Example

A $5,000 balance at 22.8% APR, which is close to the US average, with a $25 minimum floor. Step 1 - the monthly interest 5,000 x 0.228 / 12 = $95.00 a month. This is the number every payment is measured against. Anything at or below $95 never clears the card. Step 2 - the minimum under Rule A (1% plus interest) First payment: 1% of 5,000 + 95.00 = 50.00 + 95.00 = $145.00. Of that, $95.00 is interest and only $50.00 comes off the balance. The balance falls 1% a month, so the card clears in 232 months - 19 years and 4 months - and costs $13,414 in total. You will have paid $8,414 in interest on a $5,000 balance. Step 3 - the minimum under Rule B (flat 2% of the balance) First payment: 2% of (5,000 + 95.00) = $101.90. The payment is smaller, which sounds better, but $95.00 of it is interest. Only $6.90 comes off the balance. At that rate the card takes 1,161 months - 96 years - and costs $59,301. The same balance, the same APR, the same 'minimum payment'. The rule your issuer uses changes the answer by more than three quarters of a century. This is why the rule selector is the first thing to check against your cardholder agreement. Step 4 - the three-year figure from your statement P = 5,000 x 0.019 / (1 - 1.019^-36) = $193.03 a month. Total cost: $6,949. Against the Rule A minimum, paying an extra $48 a month saves $6,465 and sixteen years. Step 5 - a round number instead Paying a flat $250 a month clears the card in 26 months at a total cost of $6,350. That is $57 more a month than the three-year figure and it saves a further $599 and ten months. The pattern is the same every time: because the minimum falls as the balance falls, holding your payment flat is by far the most powerful thing you can do. You are not paying more, you are simply refusing to pay less.

Reference Data & Values

rule nameformulaapplicability
Minimum: percent of balance + interestpayment = max(floor, p x B + i)The common rule at large US issuers, typically 1% plus interest and fees. Principal falls by the full percentage every month regardless of APR, so a $5,000 balance at 1% clears in roughly 19 years rather than a lifetime.
Minimum: flat percent of the balancepayment = max(floor, p x (B + i))The simpler, older rule, typically 2-3% of the statement balance. Principal falls by only (p - monthly rate), so on a high-APR card the balance barely moves. Check your cardholder agreement before assuming which one applies to you.
Monthly interesti = B x (APR / 100) / 12Charged on the balance carried into the month. Card issuers normally compute this daily on the average daily balance, which differs by a few cents a month; the annual difference is small enough not to change any decision.
Three-year payment (CARD Act box)P = B x r / (1 - (1 + r)^-36)The figure Regulation Z requires on your statement. It assumes no new spending and no fees, and it is calculated on your current balance only.
Minimum viable paymentpayment > B x rBelow this the balance grows every month no matter how long you pay. Any calculator that returns a payoff date beneath this line is misleading you.

Frequently Asked Questions

On a typical $5,000 balance at around 22.8% APR it is roughly 19 years if your issuer uses the common 1%-plus-interest rule, and far longer if it uses a flat percentage of the whole balance. The reason it is so slow is that the minimum shrinks as the balance shrinks, so your payment gets smaller exactly when you would want it to stay the same. Enter your own balance, rate and minimum rule above for the figure that applies to you.
It is a disclosure required by the Credit CARD Act of 2009, implemented through Regulation Z at 12 CFR 1026.7(b)(12). Your issuer must show how long the balance takes to clear if you pay only the minimum, what that costs in total, the monthly payment that would clear it in 36 months instead, and what you would save. The CFPB is explicit that you do not have to pay that amount, and that the figures are calculated on your current balance and do not take into consideration any future purchases.
Almost always because of the minimum payment assumption. Most calculators assume you pay a fixed amount every month, which is not what a minimum is. Others assume a percentage rule but do not say which of the two common rules they are using. A flat 2% of the balance and 1% plus interest sound similar and produce answers decades apart on the same card. If a calculator does not tell you which rule it applied, its number is not comparable with anyone else's.
It is in your cardholder agreement, usually under a heading like 'Minimum Payment' or 'How we calculate your payment'. Failing that, take last month's statement, look at the minimum due and the interest charged, and work backwards: if the minimum is roughly the interest plus about 1% of the balance, you are on the plus-interest rule; if it is roughly 2-3% of the balance with interest already inside it, you are on the flat rule. If you cannot tell, run both and treat the slower one as your worst case.
This calculator cannot answer that, because it does not know your circumstances. What it can tell you is the return on paying the card: money used to clear a 22.8% balance earns you a guaranteed 22.8%, which no ordinary savings account matches. The common counter-argument is that a small emergency fund stops you putting the next unexpected expense straight back on the card. Many people do a little of both for that reason. A non-profit credit counselling service can help you weigh it properly.
No. It models one balance at one purchase APR, which is the same simplification Regulation Z applies to the box on your statement. Real cards can carry several balances at different rates, and payments above the minimum are allocated to the highest-rate balance first under 12 CFR 1026.53. Annual fees, late fees, cash advance rates and expiring promotional rates will all make your real payoff slower than the figure here.
Slightly, and less than most people expect. Issuers compute interest on the average daily balance, so paying earlier in the cycle lowers that average a little. The effect is worth a few dollars a month, not a few years. Paying more is worth vastly more than paying sooner, which is why this calculator focuses on the amount rather than the timing.
Use this page to understand what any one card is costing you, then use the debt payoff calculator to decide the order to clear them in. That page compares the avalanche method, which targets the highest rate first, against the snowball method, which targets the smallest balance first, and shows the interest difference on your own figures.