Pension drawdown calculator

How does this pension drawdown calculator work?

It simulates your retirement one month at a time and reports the age your pot runs out - with the State Pension arriving visibly in the chart, and every figure in today's money so that £2,200 a month buys the same lifestyle at 60 as at 90.

The whole calculation runs in your browser; nothing you type reaches our servers. The same engine produces every table and worked example on this page, so the numbers you read here and the numbers the tool shows can never drift apart. Change any input and the chart redraws as you drag.

What does it assume, and why?

Deliberately cautious defaults, every one of them editable under "Adjust assumptions". The point of a drawdown calculator is not the single number it produces but how far that number moves when you change what it rests on.

How long will a pension pot last?

Longer than dividing the pot by a year's spending suggests, because the pot keeps growing and the State Pension takes over £1,046 a month of the load from 67. Here is how long each pot lasts at the calculator's default £2,200 a month, by the age you stop.

Two patterns are worth noticing. Reading across a row, stopping later stretches the same pot by far more than the years you worked: £300,000 lasts to age 79 from 60 and to age 90 from 65, because five more years of growth are paired with five fewer years of bridge, and from 67 it supports £2,215 a month all the way to 95. Reading down a column, each extra £100,000 buys roughly as many years as the last, or more, because a larger pot earns more growth while it is being spent.

The gap between the two spending columns is the whole decision in drawdown: spend the lower figure and the pot outlives you, spend the higher one and you have 13% more each month in exchange for the pot finishing around your ninety-fifth birthday. Our guides to whether £300,000, £500,000 and £1,000,000 are enough run each pot through both.

What is pension drawdown?

Keeping your pension pot invested after you stop work and drawing an income from it, rather than handing it to an insurer for an annuity. The money keeps growing, the income is adjustable, and what is left passes to your estate - but the pot can run out, which is the risk this calculator makes visible.

The rules, in outline. From the normal minimum pension age of 55 (57 from 6 April 2028) you can usually take a quarter of a defined contribution pension tax free, up to the £268,275 lump sum allowance, and the rest is taxed as income when you draw it. The main routes are flexi-access drawdown, where the pot moves into a drawdown fund you take an adjustable income from; UFPLS, where each lump sum you take is a quarter tax free and three-quarters taxable; a lifetime annuity, which swaps the pot for a guaranteed income; and taking the whole pot as cash. Providers do not have to offer every option, and you can transfer to one that does.

That last figure is why this calculator exists. Drawing 8% of £300,000 is £2,000 a month, and on these assumptions that empties the pot at 84 - fine on average life expectancy, a decade short of a plan that reaches 95, and worse on any smaller pot or any weaker decade of returns. Some of those people have other income and are deliberately spending a small pot before a larger one arrives; many are simply taking what they need without a picture of where the line hits the floor.

The bridge years to State Pension age

The years between stopping work and the State Pension starting are the expensive end of the plan, because the pot carries your whole spending on its own. Stop at 60 with a State Pension age of 67 and you have 7 of them, costing £184,800 at £2,200 a month.

On the default plan the pot is down to about £147,204 when the State Pension arrives - it has paid out £184,800 and lost only £152,796, because growth covered 17% of the bridge. From 67 the pot only has to find £1,154 a month, and the slope of the chart flattens accordingly. Whether the plan survives is decided by how much pot crosses that line.

Take the State Pension out entirely - a useful thought experiment, because it is what most "how long will my money last" calculators quietly do - and the same £300,000 at £2,200 a month runs out at 73 rather than 79. Those 6 years are what £12,547.60 a year for life is worth to a £300,000 pot, and why the State Pension age calculator is the first thing to check before this one.

What is a safe withdrawal rate in the UK?

There is no single UK rate, because the State Pension covers a different share of every plan: on the calculator's defaults £300,000 from 60 is never exhausted below £1,564 a month, about 6.3% of the pot a year. The famous answer is 4%, from US research into portfolios that had to survive any 30-year window since the 1920s. Applied to £300,000 it says £1,000 a month, which on these assumptions never runs out - and the gap between the two is the thing the 4% rule leaves out.

The rule ignores the State Pension and never spends the pot down. For a UK retiree both matter enormously: £12,547.60 a year of guaranteed, inflation-linked income from 67 covers 48% of a £2,200-a-month lifestyle on its own. That is why the never-runs-out rate on £300,000 from 60 is 6.3% of the pot rather than 4% - the pot only has to fund the whole lifestyle for 7 years, not thirty. It is also why the rate is different for every pot and every stopping age, which is what the table above shows and what a flat rule cannot.

The other honest caveat is that our figures assume steady growth, and 4% was built to survive the worst sequence of returns on record. Treat the never-runs-out column as the spending that works if the future is average, and the Cautious scenario as what it looks like if it is not. Someone who wants a rule of thumb could do worse than: spend the never-runs-out figure in normal years, and hold back to the Cautious figure after a bad one.

What if markets crash early in your retirement?

That is sequence-of-returns risk, and it is the biggest weakness of any smooth-growth projection, including ours. A 25% fall in your first year is £75,000 gone from £300,000 while you are selling units every month to live on. Lose it on day one and the default plan ends at 71 rather than 79; lose the same 25% at 80 and it barely matters.

1. 1Hold two years of spending in cash: £52,800 on the default planA cash buffer means you draw from cash rather than sell units while markets are down, and refill it in the good years. It costs some growth - £52,800 outside the market is 18% of the pot earning little - and it is the standard defence for a reason.
2. 2Spend flexibly rather than on autopilotThe plan above raises your withdrawal with inflation every year regardless. Skipping the inflation rise after a bad year, or trimming £200 a month until the pot recovers, is worth more than it sounds: at £2,000 a month the default pot lasts to 84, five years longer than at £2,200.
3. 3Cover the essentials some other wayIf the State Pension and any defined benefit or annuity income together cover your essential bills, a crash only threatens the discretionary part of your spending, and the pot can be left alone to recover. That is the logic behind mixing drawdown with an annuity, below.

How is pension drawdown taxed?

The calculator does not model tax, so treat your monthly spending as what you need after it. Usually a quarter of the pot - £75,000 of £300,000 - can be taken tax free, and the rest is taxed as income when you draw it, in the year you draw it, on top of any State Pension.

Before the State Pension starts you can draw up to £16,760 a year as UFPLS with no tax at all, because three-quarters of it is exactly the £12,570 personal allowance. That is the strongest argument for drawing the pension first in the bridge years and any ISA money second - the opposite of what most people do - and our SIPP vs ISA guide works through it. Taking the whole tax-free lump sum on day one is popular, but it pushes every later pound into full taxation: £110 a month more from 67, for life, on this plan.

Drawdown or annuity?

Drawdown keeps the flexibility and leaves whatever remains to your estate; an annuity swaps the pot for an income the insurer guarantees however long you live and whatever markets do. On 17 September 2026 the best rates for a £100,000 pot were £8,125 a year level or £5,566 inflation-linked at 65, so pro rata £300,000 buys the figures below.

Only 9% of pots accessed in 2024/25 bought an annuity, but the useful comparison is not either-or. The common middle path is to annuitise enough, with the State Pension, to cover the bills you cannot cut, and keep the rest in drawdown for everything else. That removes the running-out risk from the part of your life where it would hurt most and keeps the upside where you can afford it. Rates track gilt yields and change weekly, and health conditions or smoking improve them, so get a live quote before deciding.

Worked examples: three retirements

Three plans run through the same engine as the calculator above. Set the same three inputs and you will see the same chart.

How can you make a pension pot last longer?

Six levers, each priced against the default plan's age 79. The first two do most of the work; the others are cheap enough that there is no reason not to pull them.

1. 1Shorten the bridge: 62 instead of 60 lasts to 83Each year closer to your State Pension age removes a full year of self-funded spending from the most expensive end of the plan and adds a year of growth. Part-time work in the bridge years does the same job by halves.
2. 2Trim the monthly number: £2,000 a month lasts to 84£200 a month is £2,400 a year the pot never has to produce, compounding every year it is not withdrawn. At £2,500 a month the same pot ends at 74. The disposable income calculator is a good place to find out what your essentials actually cost.
3. 3Add £500 a month of other income: the pot never runs outA small defined benefit pension, a rental, a part-time day a week. Enter it under "Adjust assumptions" as other monthly income and watch the slope: £500 a month is £6,000 a year the pot is spared for life.
4. 4Mind the fees: 1% instead of 0.4% ends the plan at 77Six-tenths of a percent sounds like nothing and costs 2 years of the default plan, because it is charged on the whole pot every year you are drawing from it. Many older workplace pensions charge 0.75% or more; a platform and index fund can be under 0.4%.
5. 5Check your State Pension record: 30 qualifying years instead of 35 ends it at 77Five missing years cost £1,793 a year for life, and voluntary contributions to fill them are usually the cheapest income you will ever buy. The State Pension age calculator prices your record and the date it starts.
6. 6Draw in the right order for taxEvery pound lost to avoidable tax is a pound the pot has to replace. Using the personal allowance in the bridge years, keeping withdrawals inside the basic-rate band and taking tax-free cash gradually rather than all at once can each be worth a year or more on a plan like this one.

What this calculator leaves out

It models one pot, one person, steady growth and no tax. Each of these can move the real answer, and none of them are in the chart.

• Income tax. Withdrawals above the tax-free quarter are taxable, and the State Pension is taxable too. Enter your spending after tax, and use the table above to size the gross withdrawal it needs.
• Defined benefit pensions. A final salary or career average pension is guaranteed income the pot never has to produce. Treat it as a second State Pension: add it under other income, or subtract it from your spending.
• Couples. The calculator assumes one State Pension. A household with two full records has £25,095.20 a year arriving, which changes the answer more than almost anything else; run it with your combined pot, combined spending and other income set to the second State Pension from the date it starts.
• Sequence of returns. Growth arrives in lumps, not in a straight line, and a bad early stretch is worse than the same stretch later. The Cautious scenario and a cash buffer are the defences; the chart cannot show the luck.
• Care costs and one-off spending. A new roof at 70 or care fees at 85 are lump sums the smooth line does not contain. The flexibility to meet them is drawdown's main advantage over an annuity, and a reason to keep the never-runs-out figure in mind rather than the spend-it-all one.
• Access age. You cannot draw a pension before 55, or 57 from 6 April 2028. A plan that starts earlier has to run on ISAs or other savings until then.

The ONS puts life expectancy at 65 at 21.2 more years for a woman and 18.7 for a man (2022 to 2024) - to about 86 and 84. Half of us live longer. A plan that runs out at 79 is therefore fine on average and a problem for the healthy, which is the case for aiming at the never-runs-out figure of £1,564 a month, or at least for a plan that reaches 95. Read the result as an estimate to steer by, not a promise, and for a decision this size regulated advice earns its fee.