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Barista FIRE Calculator

Enter your annual expenses and part-time income to find your Barista FIRE number.

How it is calculated

The portfolio only has to fund the part of your yearly spending that part-time work does not cover. uncovered = max(0, annual expenses − part-time income), then Barista number = uncovered ÷ (withdrawal rate ÷ 100). The withdrawal rate is a percent and is used as typed, so 4 % means multiplying by 25 and 3 % means multiplying by about 33. For comparison the tool also shows full FIRE = annual expenses ÷ rate, the gap = max(0, Barista number − current portfolio), and income coverage, income ÷ expenses × 100, capped at 100 %. If income is at least the expenses, the Barista number is 0. There is no result when expenses or the rate are zero or negative, the rate is above 100, or income or portfolio is negative. Inflation, tax and returns are not modelled.

Worked example

Yearly expenses 50,000, part-time income 20,000, withdrawal rate 4 %, current portfolio 300,000. Uncovered expenses = 50,000 − 20,000 = 30,000. Barista number = 30,000 ÷ 0.04 = $750,000.00. The classic full FIRE number would be 50,000 ÷ 0.04 = $1,250,000.00. The gap is 750,000 − 300,000 = $450,000.00. Part-time income covers 20,000 ÷ 50,000 = 40.00% of expenses.

Try this example →

Common mistakes

  • Entering monthly expenses or monthly income. Both fields are yearly amounts, so a monthly figure makes the target 12 times too small.
  • Typing the withdrawal rate as a fraction (0.04). The field is a percent: 0.04 is read as 0.04 % and the Barista number jumps to $75,000,000.00 for the example above.
  • Counting part-time income before tax while expenses are after tax. Use take-home income so both sides are comparable.
  • Forgetting costs that appear after leaving a full-time job, such as private health insurance. They belong in annual expenses, otherwise the number is too low.
  • Assuming the part-time income lasts forever. If you stop working later, the portfolio must grow towards the full FIRE number shown.

Sources

About this calculator

Barista FIRE is a variation on the Financial Independence, Retire Early movement where, instead of building a portfolio large enough to cover 100% of annual expenses (the standard 25x-expenses “4% rule” target), you plan to keep working a lower-stress, part-time job — the namesake reference is a barista job partly for the flexible hours and partly for the health insurance many coffee chains offer — that covers a portion of your living costs. The required portfolio size is calculated as (annual expenses minus part-time income) divided by your safe withdrawal rate, which is the same as multiplying by 25 when the rate is 4%, applying the same safe-withdrawal logic to a smaller funding gap.

People pursuing Barista FIRE use this number because it can shrink the target portfolio dramatically compared to full FIRE — reducing a $50,000/year expense gap to $30,000 by working part-time cuts the required nest egg by $500,000 at a 25x multiple — making financial independence reachable years earlier while still allowing meaningful income-generating work.

Part-time income covers some of your yearly expenses, so the portfolio only has to fund the rest: enter expenses, expected part-time earnings, a withdrawal rate and what you have invested to see the smaller Barista FIRE target, the full FIRE number for comparison, the gap left and the share of costs your job covers.

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