Snowball pays off your smallest balance first. Avalanche pays off your highest interest rate first and usually costs less. Enter your debts to see when each method clears your first debt, when you are debt-free, and the total interest. Free, no sign-up.
Take the starter debts in the calculator: four debts totaling $22,800. A credit card ($8,400 at 24.9%), a store card ($1,100 at 17.9%), a personal loan ($3,500 at 11.9%), and a car loan ($9,800 at 6.5%). Minimums come to $660 a month. Add $250 extra and $910 goes to debt every month. The no-extra row pays just the $660, with each paid-off debt’s minimum moving to the next.
Avalanche saves about $1,380 and finishes 2 months sooner. Snowball clears its first debt 20 months sooner. Either way, the $250 extra makes you debt-free at least 16 months sooner and saves more than $3,000 in interest.
The calculator simulates your debts month by month. Each month, interest is added to every balance at its APR divided by 12, then every debt gets its minimum payment.
Your extra payment goes to one target debt. Avalanche targets the highest interest rate; snowball targets the smallest balance. When a debt is paid off, its minimum rolls into the extra, so the payment toward the next target grows over time.
The results show when each method clears its first debt, how many months it takes to be debt-free, and the total interest paid. A third row runs the same debts with no extra payment, where each paid-off debt’s minimum still rolls into the next, so you can see what your extra is worth.
Both pay every minimum and send any extra money to one debt at a time. Avalanche targets the highest interest rate first, which usually costs the least interest. Snowball targets the smallest balance first, which clears individual debts sooner and can help motivation.
Avalanche is cheaper on paper. Snowball can be easier to stick with. In one study of people paying down several debts, closing out individual accounts predicted who went on to clear all their debt (Gal and McShane, “Can Small Victories Help Win the War? Evidence from Consumer Debt Management,” Journal of Marketing Research, 2012). The best method is the one you will actually follow, and this calculator shows how big the difference is for your numbers.
Yes. Some people start with snowball to clear a small balance quickly, then switch to avalanche for the rest. Enter the balances you have left and the calculator compares both methods from where you are now.
Catch up anything past due first, then make sure secured debts like a car loan or mortgage are current, since missing those can cost you the car or the home. After that, avalanche says pay the highest APR first and snowball says pay the smallest balance first. More in Which debt to pay first.
It depends on your rates and balances, but even a modest extra amount usually cuts months or years off the timeline because it reduces the balance that interest is charged on. Try a few extra amounts in the calculator to see the difference.
Then the balance grows instead of shrinking. The calculator will flag it. Raising the payment or lowering the rate (for example with a balance transfer) is usually the first thing to look at.
Related reading: The extra $200, Which debt to pay first, Student loans on the timeline. More free calculators at theflan.app/tools.