What is retirement corpus?
A retirement corpus is the total amount of money you need to have saved by retirement to sustain your lifestyle throughout your post-work years. It accounts for inflation eroding purchasing power, investment returns on the corpus, and how long you will live after retiring. Most people significantly underestimate this number.
Formula used
How to use this calculator
- Enter current age and target retirement age
- Enter current monthly expenses
- Enter expected inflation rate (India avg: 6%)
- Enter expected return on your retirement corpus (7–8% conservative)
- Enter life expectancy (85 is a good default)
- Click Calculate Corpus
Example
Example — Retire at 60 with ₹50,000 current monthly expenses:
Current age: 30 | Retire: 60 | Expenses: ₹50,000/mo
Inflation: 6% | Return: 8% | Life expectancy: 85
Monthly expenses at retirement (30 years of 6% inflation):
= ₹50,000 × (1.06)^30 = ₹2,87,175/month
Years in retirement: 25 | Real return = 8% − 6% = 2%
Required corpus ≈ ₹7.5 crore
Monthly SIP needed from today (at 12% for 30 years): ≈ ₹15,000/month
Why starting early makes a huge difference:
| Start age | Monthly SIP needed | Total invested |
|---|---|---|
| 25 | ₹8,500 | ₹29.8L |
| 30 | ₹15,000 | ₹45L |
| 35 | ₹27,500 | ₹66L |
| 40 | ₹54,000 | ₹97L |