Tip Calculator: Tip, Total and Each Person's Share

A tip calculator turns a restaurant bill into three numbers: the tip, the total, and what each person owes. Enter your bill, pick a percentage, and the tip calculator does the math. Here is each step.

Step by step

1. Enter the bill amount in dollars.
2. Choose a tip percentage. Tap a preset (10%, 15%, 18%, 20% or 25%) or type your own. The default is 20%.
3. Set the number of people. The default is 1.
4. Pick per-person rounding: Exact, nearest $0.50, or round up to $1.
5. Optional: open the Advanced settings to choose the tip base (pre-tax subtotal or post-tax total) and enter your sales tax rate.

What you get

• Tip amount
• Total bill (bill plus tip)
• Each person's share
• Effective tip rate, shown when rounding changes what the group actually pays

The formulas

• Tip = bill × (tip % ÷ 100)
• Total = bill + tip
• Share = total ÷ number of people, then rounding
• Effective tip % = (actual paid − bill) ÷ bill × 100

Reading a restaurant bill

Take a subtotal of $86.40 with 8.875% sales tax. The tax is $7.67. A 20% tip on the pre-tax subtotal is $17.28. Together that comes to $111.35.

The tax is added to the food and drink. The tip, in the usual US custom, is figured on the subtotal before tax. If you want to check a different percentage by hand, our percentage calculator is a quick way to do it.

In the US, the usual custom is to tip on the pre-tax subtotal. Some people tip on the post-tax total instead, often because it is the larger number printed on the receipt. Both are acceptable. Neither is a rule, and the difference is small but easy to see.

The same $100 meal, two tip bases

Say a meal has a $100.00 subtotal and 8.875% sales tax. The tax is $8.88, so the post-tax total is $108.88. A 20% tip then works out like this:

Tip base	Amount tipped on	20% tip
Pre-tax subtotal	$100.00	$20.00
Post-tax total	$108.88	$21.78

Where the $1.78 comes from

The post-tax tip is $108.88 × 0.20 = $21.776, which rounds to $21.78. Subtract the pre-tax tip of $20.00 and you get $1.78.

The gap is simply the tax multiplied by the tip rate: $8.88 × 20% ≈ $1.78. A higher tax rate or a bigger bill makes the gap larger.

How to switch in the tip calculator

The tip calculator uses the pre-tax subtotal by default. To change it, open Advanced, choose the post-tax total, and enter your sales tax rate. The calculator then figures the tip on the taxed amount.

If your receipt already lists a subtotal, tip on that for the pre-tax method. Tipping percentages are social custom, not law, so use whichever base you are comfortable with.

Splitting a check evenly sounds simple until the share comes out to $34.56 and nobody has exact change. The rounding setting handles that, and the effective tip rate shows what rounding really does to the tip.

A worked example

Take an $86.40 bill, a 20% tip, and three people who round up to the next dollar.

1. Tip: $86.40 × 0.20 = $17.28
2. Total: $86.40 + $17.28 = $103.68
3. Share: $103.68 ÷ 3 = $34.56, rounded up to $35.00 each
4. The group pays 3 × $35.00 = $105.00
5. Effective tip: ($105.00 − $86.40) ÷ $86.40 × 100 = 21.53%

You typed 20%, but because everyone rounded up, the group actually tipped about 21.53%.

How the three rounding options compare

Here is the same $86.40 bill with a 20% tip, split three ways:

Rounding	Each person pays	Group pays	Effective tip
Exact	$34.56	$103.68	20.00%
Nearest $0.50	$34.50	$103.50	19.79%
Round up to $1	$35.00	$105.00	21.53%

Rounding to the nearest $0.50 can go down as well as up, so the group may end up slightly under the tip you chose. Rounding up to $1 always lands at or above it.

What the tip calculator does not do

The tip calculator splits the check evenly. It does not handle itemized orders, where each person pays for what they ordered. The effective tip rate is for information only, so you can see what the rounding did.

For costs that run over months rather than one dinner, see our loan EMI calculator.

Tipping in the US is a custom, not a law. The amounts below are typical ranges, and you can go higher or lower based on service. When in doubt, 20% on the pre-tax bill is a safe default.

Typical amounts by service

Service	Typical tip
Restaurants	15–20% of the pre-tax bill
Bars	15–20%
Food delivery	15–20%
Taxis and rideshares	15–20%
Haircut and barber	15–20%
Hotel housekeeping	$1–2 per night
Parking and shuttle attendants	$1–3

Choosing a percentage

The tip calculator's presets cover common choices: 10%, 15%, 18%, 20% and 25%. Use 15% for adequate service, 18% or 20% for good service, and 25% when someone went well beyond the basics. These are guidelines, not requirements.

Check the receipt before you tip. If a service charge is already included, you may not need to add more. For a percentage that is not in the presets, type it in as a custom value or verify it with the percentage calculator.