What starting a SIP months or years later costs by the same goal date, and how to catch up
Estimates only, not financial advice. What you type stays on your device. Updated on 24 Oct 2026.Starting a ₹10,000 monthly SIP five years late, with the goal 20 years away and an assumed 12% return, leaves about ₹50.5 lakh instead of ₹99.9 lakh. Catching up needs about ₹19,802 a month. Enter your own amount, horizon, delay and return to see the loss.
−₹49,45,719
49.5% of the start-now corpus · ₹82.4 K for each month of delayAn estimate before tax, costs and inflation; not investment advice.
| Start | Corpus at the goal | Lost | Monthly SIP to catch up |
|---|---|---|---|
| Start now | ₹99,91,479 | — | ₹10,000 |
| 6 months later | ₹93,53,891 | −₹6,37,588 | ₹10,682 |
| 1 year later | ₹87,53,254 | −₹12,38,225 | ₹11,415 |
| 2 years later | ₹76,54,392 | −₹23,37,087 | ₹13,054 |
| 3 years later | ₹66,79,208 | −₹33,12,271 | ₹14,960 |
| 5 years later | ₹50,45,760 | −₹49,45,719 | ₹19,802 |
| 10 years later | ₹23,23,391 | −₹76,68,088 | ₹43,004 |
₹10,000 a month at 12% with the goal 20 years away. Instalments at the start of each month, compounded monthly.
Enter your "Monthly SIP" and the "Assumed yearly return".
Set "Years from today to the goal", the date the money is needed.
Set "Start later by" and choose "Months" or "Years" under "Delay counted in".
Read "Corpus lost by the goal date" and "Monthly SIP to catch up", and open "Other delays" to compare more waits.
Press "Share result" to copy a link with these inputs.
Most people who delay a SIP think they are skipping a few instalments. The real loss is larger: the money that would have gone in first had the longest time to compound, and it is the growth on that money that disappears. This calculator puts a number on it.
What it compares. You enter a monthly amount, the years until your goal, an assumed yearly return and how long you would wait. The goal date stays the same. The calculator works out the corpus if you start now, the corpus if you start after the delay, the difference, and the monthly amount that would bring the late start level with the early one.
How it counts. It uses the same method as the SIP Calculator on this site: each instalment is invested at the start of the month and grows at one twelfth of the yearly return, compounded monthly. The table below the result repeats the comparison for delays of six months to ten years, so you can see how the loss grows.
The return is an assumption. Mutual fund returns are not guaranteed, they vary from year to year, and a fund can lose money. The figures show what a steady return would do, not what the market will do. Try a lower return as well as a higher one; the cost of delay is large at any positive return and only falls to the missed instalments at zero.
What it leaves out. Tax on gains, exit loads, expense ratios, inflation and step-up SIPs are not modelled. Nor does it say which fund to buy or whether a SIP suits you. For a single SIP with a yearly increase, use the Step-up SIP Calculator; to see what a lump sum grows to, use the Lumpsum Calculator.
The catch-up figure is rounded up to the next rupee, so it reaches the start-now corpus rather than falling just short.
At an assumed 12% a year, a ₹10,000 monthly SIP for a goal 20 years away reaches about ₹99.9 lakh if started now and about ₹50.5 lakh if started five years later. Waiting a quarter of the time halves the corpus, because the lost years are the ones with the most compounding ahead of them.
Divide the start-now corpus by what one rupee a month grows to over the shorter period. For the example above, a five-year delay needs about ₹19,802 a month instead of ₹10,000 to finish level. The calculator shows this catch-up amount and the extra over your planned instalment for any delay you enter.
Instalments made early stay invested longest. Skipping the first five years removes ₹6 lakh of instalments in the example, but those instalments would have grown for 15 to 20 years. The corpus lost is about ₹49 lakh, of which only ₹6 lakh is money you did not put in.
No. Mutual fund returns change every year, can be negative, and past returns do not predict future ones. The return entered here is an assumption for illustration. Try a cautious figure such as 8% alongside a hopeful one, and treat both results as estimates rather than promises.
No. Capital gains tax, exit loads, fund expenses and inflation are left out, so the corpus figures are before tax and in future rupees. The comparison between starting now and later still holds, because both starts face the same tax and costs on similar gains.
Each instalment is invested at the start of the month and grows at the yearly return divided by 12, compounded monthly: corpus = monthly amount × [((1 + i)^n − 1) ÷ i] × (1 + i). The delayed start uses the same formula with fewer months, so the two numbers are directly comparable.
Formula only: no rates or limits are read from an official source.
Still stuck? Ask about SIP Delay Cost Calculator and anybody who knows can answer. No account needed.
Also works as: Cost of Delay in Investing Calculator.
Same job, other tools: Step-up SIP Calculator – See how raising your SIP every year changes the final corpus · Value of a Dollar Calculator – What a US dollar from any year since 1913 is worth in another year, from the official CPI.
On the related tools: ROI Calculator – Return on investment as a total percentage and as a yearly (annualised) rate.