Turning estimates into your own budget

Each category shows a low and a high end. The low end suits someone who cooks at home, lives outside the centre and rarely takes taxis; the high end suits central living and eating out often.

The monthly total adds all low ends together and all high ends together, so it is the widest span. Few people sit at the extreme of every category at once, so pick a level per category instead: in the budget tool, start from Midpoint and then move the categories you know are high or low for you.

• Restaurants belong in entertainment, groceries in food. Some older estimates put dining out in both, so if food already looks high, lower one of them.
• Internet and phone are part of utilities. If your rent quote includes utilities, set utilities to the part you pay separately (often just a mobile plan).
• Transit passes: where an official pass price is listed, "Use this pass in my budget" replaces the transport amount. Add taxis or car costs on top yourself; do not add the pass to the model estimate.
• Health insurance paid by an employer should come out of healthcare.

Country pages blend expensive capitals with cheaper towns, so they usually understate costs in the main city and overstate them in smaller places. If you know where you will live, use that city's page. Use the country page only for a first rough filter, or when your destination has no page yet. To see the gap, compare the city with its country.

Quotes arrive in different shapes: annual rent, weekly rent, a one-off deposit, a quarterly bill. Convert everything to a monthly amount in one currency before entering it:

• Weekly amount × 52 ÷ 12
• Annual amount ÷ 12; quarterly ÷ 3
• One-off costs (deposit, agency fee, moving) are savings you need up front, not monthly costs. Keep them out of the monthly total.
• Foreign quotes: the tool converts with dated ECB reference rates; your bank or card rate will differ slightly.

All numbers below are invented for illustration and are not data for any real place.

A person moving to an imaginary city receives:

• Room rent quoted at 250 per week, bills included
• A mobile plan at 15 per month
• A monthly transit pass at 40
• A deposit of 1,000

Converted to monthly amounts:

• Rent: 250 × 52 ÷ 12 = 1,083 (enter in the rent row)
• Utilities: bills are included, so only the mobile plan: 15
• Transport: pass 40, plus about 20 for occasional taxis = 60
• Deposit: not monthly; set aside 1,000 separately

Food, healthcare and entertainment stay at the midpoint unless the person has better information. The tool then shows the monthly total with rent, and the yearly figure as exactly 12 times that.

Most category figures are model-generated estimates. A few locations also list officially published transit-pass prices with their source and the date they were checked. See the methodology for details, or report an estimate that looks wrong.

Try it on a page with published prices: Lisbon, Barcelona or London.