Tip Calculator

What this calculator answers

The tip on a bill, the total with it, and what each person pays, whether you split evenly or by what each person ordered. You can tip on the whole bill or on the amount before tax, round up to a whole dollar, and work backward from a tip you already left to the percentage it was. Every share is in whole cents, and the shares add up to the total exactly.

How to use it

• Bill amount: the total on the receipt, in dollars. 86.40 and $86.40 both work.
• People: how many people share the bill equally. Enter 1 if you are paying alone.
• Enter the tip as: Percent (type 18 for 18%), $ amount (the tip you left) or Total paid (bill plus tip). With the last two, the calculator works out the percentage.
• Round up: leave it at No rounding, or round the tip, the total or each person’s share up to a whole dollar. Rounding up only ever adds to the tip.
• Tip on: Whole bill; Before tax, which asks for the tax line on the receipt and leaves it out of the tip; or Other, an amount you choose, such as the price before a coupon.
• Split: Evenly, or By what each ordered, which replaces People with a row for each person: their order before tax and tip, and a name if you like.

Results update as you type. The Try buttons load four cases from this page: the tip on the whole bill, $100 paid in all, 20% when paying alone, and the split by what each ordered. Under the result, the 15%, 18%, 20% and 25% buttons change only the tip; they are shortcuts, not a suggestion of what to leave. Tip at other percentages shows 10% to 25% on your bill, and Tip with each way of rounding up puts the rounding options side by side. To weigh two choices, press Save for comparison, change an input and save again.

How to calculate a tip

Multiply the amount you are tipping on by the percentage written as a decimal, then add the tip to the bill:

$$T = B \times \frac{p}{100} \qquad A = \text{bill} + T$$

• $T$ is the tip, rounded to the nearest cent.
• $B$ is the amount you tip on: the whole bill, the bill minus its tax, or another amount you choose.
• $p$ is the tip percentage (18 for 18%).
• $A$ is the total you pay.

To go the other way and find the percentage of a tip you already left, divide by the same amount: $p = T \div B \times 100$.

Working it out in your head

Start from 10%, which is the amount divided by 10: move the decimal point one place left. On $80.00, 10% is $8.00. The rest follows from it:

• 20%: double 10%, so $16.00. Paying alone, the total is $102.40 on the example bill below.
• 15%: 10% plus half of it, $8.00 + $4.00 = $12.00.
• 18%: 20% less a tenth of itself, $16.00 − $1.60 = $14.40.
• 25%: a quarter, $80.00 ÷ 4 = $20.00.

For an awkward amount, round to whole dollars first. For 17% of $86.43, use $86: 10% is $8.60 and 1% is $0.86, so 17% is $8.60 + 7 × $0.86 = $14.62, close to the exact $14.69. The calculator shows a route like this for your own bill at the end of How this was calculated.

Worked example: $86.40 with $6.40 tax, 18% before tax, 3 people

The receipt shows $86.40, including $6.40 of tax. The three diners tip 18% on the amount before tax and split the bill evenly.

1. Amount to tip on: $86.40 − $6.40 = $80.00.
2. Tip: 0.18 × $80.00 = $14.40.
3. Total: $86.40 + $14.40 = $100.80.
4. Each person: $100.80 ÷ 3 = $33.60, of which $4.80 is tip and $28.80 is the bill.

Measured against the whole bill, the same $14.40 is 16.67% of $86.40.

Tipping on the pre-tax or after-tax amount

Neither is a rule; it is a choice, and the calculator does both. Tipping before tax leaves the tax out of the amount you tip on, so the tip is smaller by the tip rate times the tax. On the example bill, 18% of the whole $86.40 is $15.55, which is $1.15 more than 18% of the $80.00 before tax, and the total becomes $101.95.

A receipt usually shows a subtotal, the tax and the total. Enter the total as the bill amount and the tax line as the tax. When you type a new bill, replace the example’s tax too: until you change it, the calculator names the tax as an example value it is still using.

How to split the bill evenly

Divide the total by the number of people. The calculator lists each person’s share with their part of the tip and of the bill; the columns add up to the total, the tip and the bill.

Why one person pays a cent more

Money splits only into whole cents. When the total in cents does not divide evenly by the number of people, the cents left over go to some of them, one cent each. With the tip on the whole bill, $101.95 is 10,195 cents, and 10,195 ÷ 3 = 3,398 remainder 1. So one person pays $33.99 and two pay $33.98, which adds up to $101.95 exactly. Charging everyone $33.98 would leave the table a cent short.

Splitting by what each person ordered

When the orders differ a lot, choose By what each ordered under Split and enter each person’s order before tax and tip. Everyone then pays the same share of the total as their share of the orders, so the tax and the tip are shared the same way as the food and drink.

Suppose the three orders on the example receipt were $32.50, $26.00 and $21.50, which add up to the $80.00 before tax:

Person 1 ordered $32.50 ÷ $80.00 = 40.625% of the food, so they pay 40.625% of the $100.80 total, which is $40.95. Of that, $5.85 is tip: the tip is the same part of every payment, $14.40 for every $100.80 paid. Splitting evenly at $33.60 each, person 3 would have paid $6.51 more than their share.

• A dish you shared: split its price between the orders of the people who shared it. A $12.00 appetizer shared by three adds $4.00 to each order.
• Someone who is being treated: enter 0 as their order. They pay nothing, and everyone else covers their part in proportion.
• Names are optional. They label the table and the copied results, so you can paste who owes what into a group message.
• Leftover cents go to the people with the largest remainders, and the amounts still add up to the total.
• Rounding each share up rounds each person’s own amount up to a whole dollar: $41.00, $33.00 and $28.00 here, $102.00 in all.

Rounding the tip or each share

Rounding up to a whole dollar makes cash or a card split simpler, and the extra goes to the tip. For the worked example (18% on the $80.00 before tax, 3 people):

Here, rounding each share up adds the most, because each person rounds up separately: $33.60 becomes $34.00 three times, so $1.20 goes to the tip. The tip percentage is always of the amount you tip on, here the $80.00 before tax. The calculator builds the same table for your bill.

How to work out what percentage you tipped

Divide the tip by the amount you tipped on and multiply by 100. Choose $ amount and enter the tip, or Total paid and enter what you paid in all. If the three diners in the example paid $100.00 in all, the tip was $100.00 − $86.40 = $13.60. That is $13.60 ÷ $80.00 × 100 = 17% of the amount before tax, or 15.74% of the whole bill. Split three ways, one person pays $33.34 and two pay $33.33.

Reading the result

• The headline is the tip when you pay alone, what each person pays when you split (from the smallest to the largest payment, with each person named, when you split by what each ordered), or the tip percentage when you entered the tip or the total paid.
• The three figures under it give the tip and what it is a percentage of, the total, and one more that fits the case: the tip per person, what each person pays, or the amount tipped on.
• Each person’s share has one row per person and a total row, plus each order when you split by what each ordered. You can download it as a CSV file, and Copy results lists what each person pays.
• How this was calculated repeats the steps with your numbers, including how the cents were shared out and a way to check the tip in your head.
• Tip at other percentages shows 10%, 12%, 15%, 18%, 20%, 22% and 25% with everything else unchanged, and marks your own percentage. On the example, 20% would be a $16.00 tip and a $102.40 total.
• Tip with each way of rounding up is the rounding table above, for your bill.

Assumptions and limitations

• One tip percentage applies to one amount. An even split gives everyone the same share to within a cent, and the first people in the list pay any extra cent. A split by what each ordered shares the whole total, tax and tip included, in proportion to the orders, so it assumes one tax rate for everything on the bill.
• The tip is rounded to the nearest cent, with half a cent rounding up. Rounding up to a whole dollar only adds to the tip.
• The whole receipt counts as the bill. The calculator does not look for a service charge or automatic gratuity already on it.
• It does not deal with taxes on tips or with how tips are reported as income, and it is arithmetic, not financial or tax advice.
• Tipping customs vary by country, region and kind of service. The percentages here are arithmetic, not a recommendation.

Common mistakes

• Keeping the example tax with a new bill. With Before tax selected, the tip leaves out whatever is in the tax field. A new bill with the example’s $6.40 still in place tips on the wrong amount.
• Typing the percentage as a decimal. The tip field is in percent, so 0.18 means 0.18%, not 18%. The calculator asks whether you meant 18%.
• Tipping again on an automatic gratuity. Check the receipt for a service charge or gratuity line before adding a tip on top.
• Putting a shared dish under one person. In a split by what each ordered, that person then pays all of its tax and tip too. Divide its price between the people who shared it.
• Dividing and rounding each share down. Everyone paying the rounded-down share leaves the table short, and the shortfall comes out of the tip. Round up instead, or use the split list.
• Comparing tip percentages on different amounts. 18% before tax and 18% of the whole bill are different tips. The result always says which amount the percentage is of.