Inflation Calculator
See how the buying power of the US dollar has changed between any two years since 1913, using official CPI data.
$100.00 in 2000 has the same buying power as
$187.34
in 2025
+87.3%
total inflation
2.5%
avg. annual rate
Estimates based on US BLS CPI-U annual averages. US dollars only; the latest year is provisional.
How it works
- Enter a dollar amount you want to adjust for inflation.
- Pick the starting year and the target year from the dropdowns (1913–2025).
- Read the equivalent value, total inflation, and average annual rate — results update instantly.
Frequently asked questions
- How does the inflation calculator work?
- It uses the ratio of the Consumer Price Index between your two chosen years. If the CPI doubled between them, the calculator shows that a given amount would need to double to buy the same goods. The math is simply amount multiplied by the target-year CPI divided by the start-year CPI.
- Where does the CPI data come from?
- The calculator embeds annual average values of the CPI-U (Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers) published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, covering 1913 through 2025. Annual averages smooth out month-to-month swings, so results reflect the whole year rather than a single month.
- Can I calculate deflation or go backwards in time?
- Yes. Pick a later starting year and an earlier target year and the calculator shows what a modern amount was worth in past dollars. A few historical spans, such as 1930–1933, actually show negative inflation, and the calculator handles those correctly.
- Does this work for currencies other than the US dollar?
- No. CPI-U measures price changes in the United States only, so results apply to US dollars spent in the US. Other countries publish their own price indexes with different baskets of goods, and applying US figures to euros or pounds would give misleading numbers.
- Is my data sent anywhere when I use this calculator?
- No. The full CPI table is built into the page and every calculation runs locally in your browser. Nothing you type is transmitted, stored, or logged, and the tool keeps working even if you go offline after the page loads.
About this tool
This inflation calculator converts a dollar amount from one year into its equivalent in another year, using the US Consumer Price Index. Enter an amount, choose two years between 1913 and 2025, and it instantly shows the adjusted value, the total percentage change in prices over that span, and the average annual inflation rate. It answers questions like what $100 in 1980 would be worth today, or what a modern salary would have looked like in 1950s dollars.
The calculation runs entirely in your browser. A table of annual average CPI-U values from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics is embedded in the page, and the equivalent value is the original amount scaled by the ratio of the two index values. The average annual rate is the compound growth rate implied by that ratio, not a simple average — which matters over long spans, where compounding dominates. Because nothing is fetched or uploaded, results appear the moment you change an input.
Typical uses include comparing historical prices, salaries, or house values with today’s money, adjusting long-run investment returns to real terms, checking whether a raise actually kept pace with the cost of living, and putting figures from old contracts, books, or family stories into context. Writers and researchers use it to present historical amounts in current dollars so readers grasp their real size.
A few practical notes: CPI-U tracks a broad basket of urban consumer goods, so specific categories like housing, healthcare, or college tuition have often risen faster than the headline index. Values before 1913 are not available because that is when official CPI records begin. Figures for the current year use the latest annual average and are revised as the year completes, so treat recent-year results as close estimates rather than final numbers.