Inflation Calculator
See how inflation quietly eats your purchasing power. Project today's dollars into the future or past with realistic CPI assumptions.
Last reviewed: · Reviewed by the Money Scale editorial team · How we source our data
Power mode. Every input exposed, every assumption sourced, charts and shareables.
$1,000
$1,000 from 1990 = today
$2,548
in 2026 dollars (BLS CPI-U)
Same $1,000 now buys
$392
of 1990 stuff
🪙 $1,000 in 1990
That's 155% cumulative inflation since 1990.
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The Inflation Calculator shows what today's dollars will buy in 5, 10, or 30 years — and what past dollars buy today — using realistic CPI assumptions. Inflation is the silent tax that quietly turns a retirement plan that 'looks fine on paper' into a shortfall, and seeing the numbers explicitly is the only way to plan around it.
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- Sourced defaultsStarting rates and assumptions cite real data, not made-up numbers.
How this calculator works
- Enter an amount in today's dollars.
- Pick a time horizon (forward or backward).
- Set the inflation rate. The long-run US average is about 3% per year (BLS CPI-U). Recent years have run higher; the calculator lets you adjust.
- Read the projected purchasing power. The chart makes it visceral: a $1M nest egg at 3% inflation has the buying power of $554K after 20 years.
FV = PV × (1 + i)^t (or PV = FV / (1 + i)^t for past-to-present)Compound inflation works the same way as compound interest — but going the wrong way. Every year, prices rise by the inflation rate, so a fixed nominal dollar amount buys less. Over 20–30 years the effect is dramatic.
- FV
- Future value (what an amount will be worth in nominal dollars later)
- PV
- Present value (today's dollars)
- i
- Annual inflation rate
- t
- Time in years
Frequently asked questions
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