SWP Calculator — How Long Will Your Corpus Last?
Plan a Systematic Withdrawal Plan properly: monthly payout, remaining corpus year by year, the exact month your money runs out, and the maximum you can safely withdraw. Free, no sign-up, nothing stored.
🧮 SWP Calculator
Corpus grows each month at your expected return, then the withdrawal is taken out
That is 7.2% of your corpus a year.
A fixed withdrawal loses purchasing power every year. Stepping it up by roughly the inflation rate keeps your real income level — and it drains the corpus considerably faster.
*Assumes a steady return every month. Real market returns vary, and a poor first few years hurts an SWP disproportionately.
Try the SIP calculator →Year-by-year withdrawal schedule
How the corpus moves each year: what it opens at, what you take out, what it earns, and where it closes.
| Year | Opening | Withdrawn | Growth | Closing |
|---|
Rows stop at the point the corpus is exhausted. Scroll within the table for longer durations.
Why a smooth 12% never happens — and why it matters more in SWP than SIP
This calculator, like every SWP calculator, assumes the same return every single month. Markets do not work that way, and the difference is not symmetric.
Sequence-of-returns risk
In a SIP, a fall early on is good — you buy more units cheaply. In an SWP it is the opposite: you are selling units to fund each withdrawal, so a fall in the first few years means selling more units at low prices, and those units are never there to recover. Two portfolios with identical average returns can end decades apart purely because of the order the returns arrived in.
✅ What reduces the risk
- Keep 2–3 years of withdrawals in debt or liquid funds, so you never sell equity in a crash
- Withdraw below the safe limit shown above, not at it
- Use hybrid or balanced-advantage funds rather than pure equity for the withdrawal pot
- Review the withdrawal amount annually rather than setting it and forgetting
- Pause or reduce the step-up in a bad year
⚠️ What increases it
- Withdrawing more than about 6–7% of the corpus a year
- Running the entire corpus in pure equity
- Assuming 12% and planning to the rupee against it
- Raising withdrawals after a good year
- No buffer for a medical or family emergency
How SWP withdrawals are taxed
You are not taxed on the whole withdrawal — only on the gain inside it
This is the part most people get wrong. Every SWP withdrawal is partly your own capital coming back and partly gain. Only the gain portion is taxable, calculated proportionately against the units redeemed. In the early years, when the corpus has grown little, the taxable share of each withdrawal is small.
| Fund type | Held under 12 months | Held over 12 months |
|---|---|---|
| Equity funds | STCG at 20% | LTCG at 12.5% above ₹1.25 lakh of gains a year |
| Hybrid (equity-oriented) | STCG at 20% | LTCG at 12.5% above ₹1.25 lakh |
| Debt funds bought after 1 Apr 2023 | Taxed at your slab rate | Taxed at your slab rate — no LTCG benefit |
Two practical points
First, the ₹1.25 lakh annual exemption on equity LTCG is per person per year — a couple withdrawing from separate folios effectively doubles it. Second, units are redeemed on a first-in-first-out basis, so the oldest units go first and typically qualify as long-term. Section numbering changed under the Income-tax Act 2025, effective 1 April 2026; the rates above are unchanged, but confirm the current section references when filing.
SWP vs FD interest vs SCSS vs annuity
| Criterion | SWP | FD interest | SCSS | Annuity |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Return | Market-linked, typically 8–12% | 6.5–7.5% | 8.2% fixed | 6–7% |
| Capital returned | Yes, whatever remains | Yes, in full | Yes, in full | Usually not |
| Certainty of income | You set it, but the corpus may run out | Fixed | Fixed and guaranteed | Guaranteed for life |
| Tax treatment | Only the gain portion taxed | Entire interest taxed | Entire interest taxed | Fully taxed at slab |
| Flexibility | Change or stop any time | Break with penalty | Penalty before 2 years | Locked, irreversible |
| Upper limit | None | None | ₹30 lakh per person | None |
The usual sensible mix
Most retirees are best served by layering rather than choosing: fill the SCSS ceiling of ₹30 lakh first for guaranteed income, keep two to three years of expenses liquid, and run an SWP on the remainder for the growth and the better tax treatment. The SWP is the part that has to beat inflation over a thirty-year retirement — nothing else on this table does.
Plan both sides of the journey
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