Inflation calculator
Enter an amount and two years to see what the amount is worth in the dollars of the later year, how much prices changed and the average inflation for each year. The data runs from 1950 to 2026.
This answer is for the example values in the boxes above. $100 in 2000, in the dollars of 2025. Change the boxes to see your own answer.
A year is its average price index, and 2026 is its latest month so far, September. The index is the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers: an average, so what you buy may have risen more or less.
How it works
The calculator multiplies the amount by the price index of the year you end in and divides by the index of the year you start in. The index is a number that rises as prices rise, so the ratio of two years says how much prices changed between them.
A year is its annual average. The latest year of the data, 2026, is its latest month so far, which is September. You can go back in time too: to find what an amount of today buys in an earlier year, put the later year first.
The average change each year is the steady yearly rate that would give the same total change. It is not the change of any one year.
A worked example
$100 in 2000 is $186.96 in 2025. The index averaged 172.2 in 2000 and 321.943 in 2025, so prices rose 86.96 percent, or 2.53 percent a year. Going back, $186.96 of 2025 is $100 of 2000.
Here is what $100 of other years is worth in 2025: $1,335.86 for 1950, $1,087.65 for 1960, $829.75 for 1970, $390.71 for 1980, $246.32 for 1990 and $147.64 for 2010. $100 of 2025 is $104.66 in September 2026.
The index
The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers every month. It is 100 on average over the years 1982 to 1984, and the values in the calculator agree: 96.5, 99.6 and 103.9 average 100.0.
The data here start in 1950. The Bureau’s series has no value for October 2025, and the annual average for 2025 is published all the same, so that is the figure used.
What it leaves out
Prices differ by place and by what you buy, and the index is a national average. Wages, taxes and interest are not in it. For one month inside a year the calculator does not help, because a year is its annual average.
Sources
Questions
How do you calculate the value of money over time?
Multiply the amount by the price index of the later year and divide by the index of the earlier year. $100 in 2000, when the index averaged 172.2, is $186.96 in 2025, when it averaged 321.943.
How much has the dollar lost in value since 1950?
Prices in 2025 were 13.36 times the prices of 1950, so it takes $1,335.86 in 2025 to buy what $100 bought in 1950. That is an average rise of 3.52% a year.
What is the average inflation rate over a period?
It is the yearly rate that gives the same total change over the years between. From 2010 to 2025 prices rose 47.64%, which is 2.63% a year, and from 2000 to 2025 they rose 86.96%, which is 2.53% a year.
Which price index does the calculator use?
The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers, all items, for the U.S. city average and not seasonally adjusted, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A year is its annual average, and 2026 is the latest month, September.
Why is my own inflation different from the index?
The index is an average of what urban households buy. Your rent, your car and your groceries may have risen more or less than that average, so treat the result as a guide and not as your own rate.
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