Savings calculator: discover how much interest you could earn

Our calculator can reveal how much your savings will be worth in a set period of time – be it one year or 10, and whether you have a lump sum or you’re planning to make regular monthly contributions.

How to use this calculator

The first step is to enter your account’s current balance – this can be £0 if you haven’t started saving yet. The next box is for any monthly saving amounts, but you can leave this blank if you’re not planning to make any additional contributions.

Next, enter the number of years you want to save for, and the annual interest rate.

Finally, click the “calculate” button to see your result.

What is this tool useful for?

This calculator is useful for showing you:

• How much your savings will be worth in a certain number of years – if you’re saving for a particular goal, such as a holiday in three years, you’ll be able to see whether your planned monthly additions will give you enough.
• The impact of a lower interest rate over a certain period, which can be helpful if you’re considering switching to a higher rate account. For example, saving £10,000 for a year in an account that pays 2pc will leave you with £10,201.84 – but swapping to an account that pays 4.5pc will give you £10,459.40, an extra £257.56.
• Whether or not you might need to pay tax on your savings interest. This will only be the case if your annual interest exceeds your personal savings allowance – for basic-rate taxpayers this is £1,000, and £500 for higher-rate taxpayers. There’s no allowance if you pay additional-rate tax. Our tax on savings calculator can reveal how much tax you could end up paying.
• The benefits of getting into a regular savings habit – however small. Say you had £10,000 to put away in an account paying 4pc for five years. If you add nothing to it, you’ll have a balance of £12,209.97 after five years. Committing to adding just £50 a month over the same period, however, would leave you with £15,524.91.

Compound interest

This calculator shows the benefit of compound interest – when interest is paid on your savings, and then forms a larger balance on which to earn even more interest, and so on. It has a snowball effect, which can see your balance grow without any extra effort from you.

Where to find the best savings rates?

Telegraph Money has a series of helpful guides that show the top savings and cash Isa rates, with tables that update automatically every day.

If you want to maintain access to your cash, the best current accounts and best easy access accounts will have some options for you. You might also want to consider the best regular savings accounts, as well as the best notice accounts.

If you can lock up your money for a set period of time, you might be better off with a fixed-rate bond. And, for tax-efficient accounts, see our pick of the best cash Isas, and the best lifetime Isas.

Finally, if you want to put money away for your kids, don’t miss the best children’s savings accounts, and best Junior cash Isas.