Amortization Calculator
See your full year-by-year loan amortization schedule.
Your Details
How It Works
- Enter your loan amount, rate, and term.
- Press Calculate to see the full year-by-year schedule.
Formula Used
Good to Know
- • Early payments are interest-heavy; later payments are principal-heavy.
- • The full schedule shows exactly when your balance crosses key milestones.
Important Notes
- • Assumes a fixed rate and no extra payments.
- • Yearly rollup shown; monthly detail follows the same pattern.
Reading an Amortization Schedule
An amortization schedule breaks every payment into its principal and interest components, showing exactly how the balance declines over the life of the loan. Early in the schedule, the vast majority of each payment goes to interest since the balance — and therefore the interest charged on it — is still high; as the balance shrinks, more of each payment shifts toward principal.
Why This Table Is Useful Beyond Curiosity
Beyond satisfying curiosity about where your payments go, an amortization schedule is useful for planning — checking your balance at a specific future date (useful for PMI removal timing or refinance decisions), or seeing exactly how much interest extra payments would save by comparing schedules with and without them.
A Quick Glossary
- Amortization — the gradual repayment of a loan through scheduled payments, each split between principal and interest.
- Amortization schedule — a table showing every payment's split, and the resulting balance, across the loan's life.
Let's Run the Numbers: Reading Year 1 vs. Year 20
On a $300,000 loan at 6.5% over 30 years, comparing the first and 20th year of payments:
Year 20: ≈$14,700 principal, ≈$8,200 interest (mostly principal)
By year 20, the annual principal paid is roughly quadruple year 1's, even though the total payment barely changed — a direct result of the shrinking balance producing less interest each year, letting a growing share of each payment attack the principal.
Balance Milestones Table
On a $300,000 loan at 6.5% over 30 years, remaining balance at key milestones:
| Year | Remaining Balance | % Paid Off |
|---|---|---|
| 5 | $280,900 | 6.4% |
| 15 | $220,400 | 26.5% |
| 25 | $91,200 | 69.6% |
Notice how slowly the balance drops in the early years compared to the later ones — this "back-loaded" equity build-up is a defining feature of long amortizing loans.
Where People Go Wrong Reading an Amortization Schedule
- Assuming equal principal reduction each year — principal paydown accelerates over time, it isn't linear.
- Forgetting extra payments change the whole schedule — any extra payment shortens the entire remaining schedule, not just that month.