If you already know what Coast FIRE is and just want the table, skip three sections down. If you want the concept, the formula derivation and the variants, we covered all that in Coast FIRE India: The Number Where You Can Stop Investing. This post is the practical companion. A lookup you can find your own line in, in about thirty seconds.
The idea, in one paragraph
Your FIRE number is what you need at retirement. Coast FIRE is what you need today so that if you never invested another rupee and just let it compound until retirement, it would grow into your FIRE number. Everything you earn after crossing that line is for living, not for the future. You still have to work. You just don't have to save.
The formula
Coast FIRE number = FIRE number ÷ (1 + r)n
r is your expected nominal return, we use 11% blended for a mostly-equity accumulation portfolio. n is years until you plan to retire. That is all it is. Your FIRE number discounted back to today.
Why the table is keyed to spending, not salary
Coast FIRE depends on what you spend, not what you earn. An earlier version of this post used a shortcut that a lot of calculators use: assume retirement spending is half your gross salary. It is roughly fair at ₹10-15 LPA, where tax, EPF and commuting really are most of the gap between CTC and life. It falls apart at the top.
Half of ₹80 LPA is ₹40 lakh a year. That is ₹3.3 lakh a month, every month, for thirty years of retirement. Almost nobody spends that, and the person on ₹80 LPA who is anywhere near Coast FIRE is by definition not spending it, because that is how they got there. Spending plateaus. A good flat, a car, school fees, decent holidays and someone to help at home is a comfortable Indian life at ₹1.5-2 lakh a month whether you earn ₹50 lakh or ₹1.5 crore. Income keeps climbing after that. Lifestyle mostly does not.
So the table below is keyed to the number that actually drives it: what you expect to spend each month in retirement, in today's rupees. If you have no idea, take your current monthly spend and subtract the things that stop, meaning the EMI you will have cleared, the commute, and whatever you are currently saving. Most people land lower than they expect.
If you only know your salary, this gets you into the right row.
| If you earn | A realistic retirement spend |
|---|---|
| ₹10 LPA | ₹40,000 - ₹50,000 a month |
| ₹15 LPA | ₹50,000 - ₹65,000 |
| ₹20 LPA | ₹65,000 - ₹80,000 |
| ₹30 LPA | ₹90,000 - ₹1.1 L |
| ₹50 LPA | ₹1.2 L - ₹1.6 L |
| ₹80 LPA and above | ₹1.5 L - ₹2 L |
Notice the plateau at the bottom. That is the point, not a shortcut. Above roughly ₹50 LPA your Coast FIRE number stops tracking your payslip, which is why high earners cross the line far earlier than they think they have.
The table
Assumptions: retirement at 55, 11% nominal returns while you accumulate, 6% inflation, 3.3% withdrawal rate. Every figure is in today's rupees, discounted at the 4.7% real return those two rates imply, so you can compare it directly against what you hold right now. Find your spending row, then your age. If your invested corpus (mutual funds, EPF, PPF, NPS, equities, but not your house and not your emergency fund) is above that cell, you have coasted.
| Retirement spending | Age 28 | Age 32 | Age 36 | Age 40 | Age 45 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ₹50,000 / month | ₹52 L | ₹63 L | ₹76 L | ₹91 L | ₹1.15 cr |
| ₹75,000 / month | ₹79 L | ₹94 L | ₹1.14 cr | ₹1.37 cr | ₹1.72 cr |
| ₹1 L / month | ₹1.05 cr | ₹1.26 cr | ₹1.51 cr | ₹1.82 cr | ₹2.29 cr |
| ₹1.5 L / month | ₹1.57 cr | ₹1.89 cr | ₹2.27 cr | ₹2.73 cr | ₹3.44 cr |
| ₹2 L / month | ₹2.10 cr | ₹2.52 cr | ₹3.03 cr | ₹3.64 cr | ₹4.59 cr |
| ₹3 L / month | ₹3.14 cr | ₹3.78 cr | ₹4.54 cr | ₹5.46 cr | ₹6.88 cr |
Numbers rounded. Retiring earlier than 55 raises every cell a lot. See the sensitivity section below.
Reading it honestly
Two things jump out.
The numbers at 28 look low. ₹1.05 crore for a ₹1 lakh a month retirement sounds like a lot until you notice it is under half the ₹2.29 crore the same person needs at 45, for exactly the same retirement. That gap is seventeen years of compounding doing the work instead of you. It is the best argument there is for front-loading your investing in your twenties, and no amount of discipline at 45 buys back what those years were worth.
The numbers at 45 are close to a full FIRE number. By 45, with ten years to run, Coast FIRE and FIRE converge. Compounding has too little runway left to do much. If you are 45 and starting out, Coast FIRE is not a useful intermediate milestone. You are essentially aiming at the real number.
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Sensitivity: the retirement age assumption
The table uses 55. Early, but not radical. Here is the same person, 32 years old and planning on ₹1 lakh a month, under different target ages, to show how much this one input moves everything.
Every five years you pull the date forward adds about a quarter to the number, and it compounds: coasting to 42 costs more than twice what coasting to 60 costs. So when somebody says they have hit Coast FIRE, the useful follow-up is not how much they have. It is coasting to what age.
Get your exact number instead of the band
The table works in ₹25,000 jumps. If you know your own monthly number, the calculator gives you the exact FIRE figure. Divide it by 1.047 raised to the years left to get your Coast FIRE line.
Calculate my FIRE Number →So you have crossed it. Now what?
Almost nobody stops investing entirely and they shouldn't. Crossing Coast FIRE hands you an option rather than an instruction, and it opens up four of them.
Take the pay cut
The most valuable thing Coast FIRE buys is the ability to take a job that pays 30% less and is far better. Once your future is funded, salary only has to cover the present. People find this the most life-changing option and anticipate it the least.
Keep investing and retire much earlier
Coast FIRE at 32 for retirement at 55 means that if you keep the SIP running you will hit the real number well before 55. Often by 45 to 47. Coasting is the floor, not the plan.
Spend the surplus on purpose
A sabbatical. A degree. A business attempt. A year with a newborn. Proper help for aging parents. The things that cost money and have a time window on them. Coast FIRE is permission to use money for those without wrecking the plan.
Build the safety layers you skipped
Most people at Coast FIRE have a thin emergency fund, weak health cover and no term plan. Redirecting the SIP into those for a year does more for you than more index units would.
Three ways the table lies to you
- It assumes 11% for decades. Real sequences are not smooth. If the first five years after you stop investing are flat, you are behind and you have no SIP running to buy the dip. Keeping a 15-20% cushion above the table number is sensible.
- It assumes the spend you picked is the spend you get. Children, a parent needing care, or a move to a costlier city all push you into a higher row after you have stopped investing, which un-coasts you retroactively. Recheck every year.
- EPF and PPF are not 11% assets. If a big share of your corpus sits in debt instruments returning 7-8%, the growth assumption in the table overstates you. Use your actual weighted portfolio return rather than 11% blindly.
The short version
- Coast FIRE is your FIRE number discounted back to today. Cross it and compounding finishes the job on its own.
- It is driven by what you will spend, not what you earn. Above about ₹50 LPA the two stop moving together.
- Planning on ₹1 lakh a month and retiring at 55, the line is about ₹1.05 crore at 28 and ₹2.29 crore at 45. Same retirement, priced by how much runway is left.
- Target retirement age is by far the most sensitive input. Moving the date from 55 to 45 raises the number by about 60%.
- It is an option, not an instruction. The best use is a job that pays less and costs you less of your life.
- Recheck annually. Kids, caregiving and a city move all raise your FIRE number after the fact.
Find your cell. If you are above it you have more freedom than you were operating with this morning. If you are below it you now know the exact number that changes that, which is a much better thing to aim at than a corpus figure thirty years out.