SWP Calculator

It depends on your withdrawal rate, meaning your yearly withdrawals as a share of the corpus, compared with the return it earns. If the withdrawal rate stays below the return, a steady return would let the corpus last indefinitely. If it's above, the corpus shrinks over time, and the bigger the difference, the faster it runs out. The table above gives a quick guide for ₹50 lakhs.

If you're living off your SWP, a step-up helps your income keep pace with rising prices, so ₹35,000 buys roughly as much in year 10 as it does today. The trade-off is that the corpus runs down faster. Tick the step-up option to see how both choices play out.

Each withdrawal is treated as selling some of your units. Only the gain on those units is taxed, not the part that returns your own money. For equity-oriented mutual funds, gains on units held up to 12 months are taxed at 20%, and gains on units held longer at 12.5%, with the first ₹1.25 lakh of long-term gains each financial year tax-free. Cess applies on top. Rules can change, so check the current position or speak to a tax adviser.

Early on, your units haven't grown much since you bought them, so most of each withdrawal is your own money coming back, and only a small part is gain. As the years pass and the value of each unit rises, a bigger share of every withdrawal is gain, so the tax rises too.

The exemption applies once per person per financial year, across all your equity gains, not to each investment separately. Since the calculator can't know your other gains, it leaves the exemption out, which keeps the estimate on the safe side. If this SWP is your only source of equity gains, your actual tax could be noticeably lower than shown.

For resident individuals, mutual funds generally don't deduct tax from redemptions. You receive the full withdrawal and pay any tax due when you file your return, or through advance tax. The calculator shows tax against each instalment so you can see what you'll actually keep.

The tax figures assume an equity-oriented fund. Gains on debt funds bought on or after 1 April 2023 are taxed at your income tax slab rate, whatever the holding period, and other fund types have their own rules. The corpus figures still hold for any fund, but the tax shown won't match for non-equity funds.

Yes, a lot. When you're withdrawing, a fall early on means selling more units at low prices to fund the same instalment, and those units never get the chance to recover. The same fall late in the plan does far less damage. The calculator assumes a steady return, so leave yourself a margin, especially for a long SWP.

It depends on where the corpus is invested. Equity funds have historically offered higher long-run returns but with bigger swings, which matters more when you're withdrawing. Many people use hybrid or debt-oriented funds for an SWP and assume a lower return. Past returns don't guarantee future ones, so try a cautious rate as well.

They work differently. FD (opens in new tab) interest is fully taxed at your slab rate every year, while an SWP from an equity-oriented fund is taxed only on the gain portion of each withdrawal, at capital gains rates. On the other hand, FD returns are fixed, while an SWP's value moves with the market. Many people use a mix of both.

Our FD calculator shows what a deposit pays out, monthly or at maturity

Yes. Most funds let you change the amount, pause or stop an SWP at any time. Withdrawals within a set period of investing, often the first year, may attract an exit load (opens in new tab), so check your fund's terms.

Work backwards from the monthly income you want and how long it has to last. The table above gives a feel for it at ₹50 lakhs, and if the SWP is meant to fund your retirement, the retirement calculator sizes the corpus (opens in new tab) for you from what you spend today.

Our retirement calculator sizes the corpus you will need

No. Nothing you enter in this SWP calculator is stored.