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Debt Avalanche Calculator

Enter each debt's balance and interest rate to get your avalanche payoff order.

How it is calculated

For up to three debts, enter each balance in dollars and its annual interest rate as a percentage (24.99 means 24.99%). The tool sorts the debts by rate from highest to lowest with sort by rate, descending, marks the first as pay first and the others as pay next, and adds up the balances: total = balance₁ + balance₂ + balance₃. It also reports the highest rate. A debt with a blank or zero balance is left out, and a debt with a balance but no rate is treated as 0%. Debts with equal rates stay in the order you typed them. The tool is a ranking only. It does not calculate payoff time, monthly payments, interest saved or the effect of extra payments, and the minimum payment on every debt still has to be paid each month.

Worked example

You have three debts: a car loan of 3,200 at 7.5%, a store card of 1,800 at 24.99% and a credit card of 9,500 at 18.5%. Sorted by rate, the order is 1. the store card at 24.99%, 2. the credit card at 18.5%, 3. the car loan at 7.5%. The total balance is 3200 + 1800 + 9500 = $14,500.00 and the highest rate is 24.99%. Note that the smallest balance (the store card) comes first here only because it also has the highest rate; the 9,500 card would not be first even though it is the largest.

Try this example →

Common mistakes

  • Entering the monthly rate (for example 2%) instead of the annual rate; the order may still be right, but the percentages shown will not match your statements.
  • Entering a rate as a fraction such as 0.18 instead of 18; it is read as 0.18%.
  • Leaving the rate blank for a debt, which counts it as 0% and moves it to the bottom of the list.
  • Expecting the tool to show how long payoff takes or how much interest you save; it only ranks the debts.
  • Stopping the minimum payments on the lower-ranked debts; the avalanche method puts only the extra money on the top debt.

Sources

About this calculator

The debt avalanche method pays off debts in order of interest rate, highest first, while making minimum payments on everything else. Because interest compounds fastest on the highest-rate balance, attacking it first minimizes the total interest paid over the life of all your debts — mathematically the cheapest payoff order.

This calculator ranks up to three debts by their interest rate so you know exactly which balance to throw extra payments at. It's the method favored by personal finance advisors for people who want to save the most money, as opposed to the “debt snowball” (smallest balance first), which trades some interest cost for the psychological win of closing accounts faster.

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Comments (1)

  • Editorial team

    The order depends entirely on the rate you type, so enter what the lender will charge going forward. A card on a promotional 0 percent offer is worth ranking at the rate it jumps to when the promotion ends, otherwise it lands at the bottom and gets ignored until it is too late. Once a debt is cleared, clear its row and run the list again. Do you have a balance whose rate is about to change?

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