Auto Loan Payment Calculator

Optional. A manufacturer's promotional rate offered instead of the cash rebate, often 0 percent. Leave it blank for no comparison. When it is entered, the same deal is priced a second time at this rate with no rebate, and the cheaper of the two offers is named. An entered 0 is a real 0 percent offer, not a blank. Few buyers get one: Edmunds reported 1.2 percent of new-car buyers did in the second quarter of 2026.

Whether your state charges sales tax on the price before a manufacturer's rebate comes off, or after it. Virginia's motor vehicle agency says on its own page that it taxes the price after the rebate; how other states treat a rebate could not be confirmed from their own pages, and no official table covers every state, so the choice is yours to make.

How many monthly payments the loan runs for. A longer term lowers the payment and raises the interest every time, and it keeps you owing more than the car is worth for longer. It must be a whole number of months; the table at the foot prices terms either side of yours, a few of them longer than this input allows.

Optional. Your modified adjusted gross income for the year. Leave it blank if it is at or below the level where the car-loan interest deduction starts to shrink, and the full deduction is counted. Above that level the final regulations take 200 off the deduction for each 1,000 or part of 1,000 of income, so it is worth far less than its 10,000 headline to many buyers. The slider moves in steps of 1,000, so enter your income rounded up to a whole 1,000 (an income of 113,500 is entered as 114,000): because part of 1,000 counts as a whole 1,000, rounding up always gives the exact reduction, while rounding down can show a deduction the rule does not leave.

The combined state and local rate charged on a vehicle sale, entered as a percentage, so 7.5 percent is 7.50%. Several states tax vehicles at a rate or on a base of their own, so use the rate your state charges on a vehicle; the base it is charged on follows the two state rules.

Optional. What the dealer allows for the car you trade in. Leave it blank if there is none, and it reads as nothing. It comes off the amount financed, and it also comes off the taxed price when your state credits a trade-in.

The price agreed with the seller for the car itself, before sales tax, fees, any rebate or any trade-in. Everything else is built from it: the sales tax is charged on it under the two state rules, the loan starts from it, and the car's estimated value starts from it and falls from the first month.

Optional. The payoff still owed on the car you trade in, as its lender quotes it, to the dollar. Leave it blank if nothing is owed, and it reads as nothing. Any amount above the trade-in's value is negative equity: it is added to this loan, it is not taxed, and under the final regulations its interest does not count toward the car-loan interest deduction.

Whether your state charges sales tax on the price less the trade-in's value, or on the full price. California and Virginia say on their own agencies' pages that they do not credit a trade-in. Choose the rule that matches your state: it is not looked up, because your state's own revenue agency is the authority on it.

Optional. How much of its remaining value the car loses in each later year. Leave it blank to use 14 percent, the rate that, after a first year of 20, loses the 56.2 percent over five years that AAA's 2026 driving-cost study implies. An entered 0 means no loss after the first year. Like the first-year rate it moves the value line, not the loan.

Optional. The dealer's documentation fee and any other charge the dealer adds to the price. Leave it blank if there is none, and it reads as nothing. These fees are taxed with the price, as the states that address them say, and are financed with it.

Optional. Your federal income tax bracket rate, entered only if this car qualifies for the 2025 law's car-loan interest deduction: bought new, with final assembly in the United States, for personal use, with a loan secured by the car. Leave it blank and the deduction is not counted, which is right for a used, imported, leased or business vehicle; whether yours qualifies is not something the model can check.

The annual percentage rate on the loan. It is divided by twelve to give the rate charged each month, which is how an APR is defined, and a lender that charges interest on a daily balance will differ from this by cents. Zero is allowed and priced as a plain division of the amount by the months. It is also what the table at the foot varies down its side.

Optional. Customer cash from the manufacturer, taken off the price. Leave it blank if there is none, and it reads as nothing. Whether it also comes off the taxed price is the rebate rule. Enter a promotional rate as well to see whether the rebate or the low rate offered instead of it costs less.

Cash paid toward the car at signing, which reduces what is borrowed. It is asked for rather than assumed because nothing down is a real answer and not an omission: many loans are written that way, and then the whole cost is borrowed. A trade-in and a rebate are entered separately and are not part of this figure.

Optional. How much of the price the car loses in its first year. Leave it blank to use 20 percent, Kelley Blue Book's own statement of a typical first year, for which it publishes no dataset. An entered 0 means the car keeps its whole value that year. It moves only the value line and the months upside down, never the loan.

Optional. Title, registration and plate fees paid to the state at purchase. They vary by state from tens to thousands of dollars and no national figure exists to stand in for them, so a blank reads as nothing: the fees are then left out, and the total cost, and the payment when they are financed, are understated by them. They are not taxed.

The filing status on your federal return. It sets the income above which the car-loan interest deduction starts to shrink, which under the 2025 law is 200,000 of modified adjusted gross income on a joint return and 100,000 on the others. Nothing else reads it, so it matters only when a tax rate and an income are entered.

Whether the sales tax and the government fees are added to the loan or paid in cash at signing. Adding them raises the amount financed, the payment and the interest, and it is one of the usual reasons a loan starts out owing more than the car is worth.

The terms across the top of the table: your own term in the middle, then six-month steps either side, never shorter than a month. The longest columns can pass what the term input allows; they are priced the same way, since the interest needs no schedule. Read down a column to hold the term and vary the rate.

The sales tax on this purchase, at the rate entered on the taxed price. When the tax is added to the loan it is borrowed too, so it carries interest for the whole term.

Machinery. Excel requires the figure being tabulated to sit at the top-left corner of the table, where it means nothing to a reader, so it is hidden. It holds the interest over the whole loan.

Machinery, and NOT an input. The same for the term: each term across the top is put here in turn while the table is filled, and the rest of the time it repeats the term you entered.

The interest over the whole loan at the promotional rate, on the larger amount that is borrowed without the rebate. At 0 percent it is nothing. It is 0 when no promotional rate is entered.

Everything the purchase costs on the promotional offer: the full price with no rebate, its sales tax, the fees, the interest at the promotional rate and any trade-in debt. It is 0 when no promotional rate is entered.

The promotional offer's total cost less the rebate offer's. Positive means taking the rebate at your APR is cheaper by that much; negative means the promotional rate is. Where your state taxes the price before the rebate, the rebate still carries its tax, and the comparison counts it.

The part of the loan whose interest can count toward the car-loan interest deduction: the amount financed less any debt carried over from a trade-in, as a share of the amount financed. The final regulations exclude interest on that debt, and the model spreads the exclusion evenly over every month's interest, which the regulations do not prescribe. It is never below 0.

Everything the purchase costs, less the federal income tax the deduction saves. With no tax rate entered it equals the total cost.

Everything this purchase costs over the loan: the price less any rebate, the sales tax, the dealer and government fees, the interest, and any debt carried over from the trade-in. Insurance, fuel, upkeep and the value the car keeps at the end are not in it.

Every payment added up: the monthly payment times the number of months. Add the cash at signing and any trade-in equity used and you have everything the purchase costs.

What the loan charges in interest over its whole life: the total of the payments less the amount financed. It is the figure the table at the foot tabulates, and it rises with both the APR and the term.

Machinery, and NOT an input. While the table is filled, each APR down its side is put here in turn and the whole model reads it; the rest of the time it repeats the APR you entered. Change the APR above, never this: the axis is built from the APR you entered, so changing this would move the axis while the table is being filled.

The APRs down the side of the table: your own rate in the middle, then one percentage point steps either side, never below 0 percent. Read along a row to hold the rate and vary the term.

The amount the sales tax is charged on: the price and the dealer fees, less the trade-in when your state credits it, and less the rebate when your state taxes the price after it. Government fees and any debt from a trade-in are never part of it.

The body of the table: the interest over the whole loan on this same deal, worked out again for every pair of APR and term on the two axes. One hundred and twenty-one figures, each the whole calculation run again, with less interest green and more red. Nothing here is a forecast or a probability: both axes are choices on your offer.

The monthly payment if you take the promotional rate instead of the rebate: the same deal with the rebate left out, financed at the promotional rate over the same term. It is 0 when no promotional rate is entered.

What the deduction loses each tax year because of income: 200 for each 1,000 or part of 1,000 of modified adjusted gross income above the threshold for your filing status. It is shown whenever a tax rate and an income are both entered, whatever the term, because it is a fact about the income rather than the loan.

The deduction for the first tax year: that year's qualifying interest, capped at 10,000 and reduced for income, never below 0. The first payment is taken to fall in January 2026, so payments 1 to 12 count in that year; a loan whose first payment comes later counts fewer, so this is an upper estimate. It is 0 when no tax rate is entered.

What the first year's deduction saves in federal income tax: the deduction times the tax rate entered. It is a saving on your return, not a lower rate on the loan, and state income tax on it is not counted.

What the deduction saves over all its tax years at the tax rate entered. It is usually far below the 10,000 a year the law allows, because a typical loan pays much less interest than that, and most of it early.

Names the cheaper of the two offers, says they cost the same when the totals are within half a cent, or says that no promotional rate was entered. It compares total cost, not the monthly payment, and it assumes you qualify for the promotional rate, which usually needs top-tier credit.

What is borrowed: the price and the dealer fees, the sales tax and government fees when they are added to the loan, and any debt from the trade-in, less the rebate, the down payment and the trade-in's value. It is never shown below nothing; when the cash and credits cover everything there is no loan to price.

The deduction added over the tax years the law covers, 2026 to 2028 with the first payment in January 2026: the first 36 payments' qualifying interest, each year capped and reduced for income. Interest paid after 2028 is not deductible under the law as written.

The cash paid when the deal is signed: the down payment, plus the sales tax and government fees when they are not added to the loan.

The level payment that clears the amount financed over the term at the APR, the same every month. It is not rounded to cents: a lender rounds each payment and lets the last one absorb the difference, and one that charges daily interest differs by cents with the payment dates.

Reads OK, or explains why the inputs cannot be priced, or what deserves a second look: a trade-in worth less than what is owed on it, owing more than the car is worth for more than half the loan, or a deduction the income has fully phased out.

The amount by which what is still owed on the trade-in exceeds what it is worth, carried into this loan. It is money borrowed for a car you no longer own, so it raises the payment and the interest, and it starts this loan owing more than the new car is worth.

How many month-ends of the loan find you owing more than the car's estimated value, by more than half a cent. In those months, selling or trading the car, or losing it to theft or a crash without gap cover, would leave a debt to clear. It rests on the value estimate, which is typical depreciation at average mileage.

The most by which the balance exceeds the car's estimated value at any month-end of the loan, the day of signing included; 0 if it never does. It is the debt you would have to clear if you sold at the worst moment.

The agreed price less the amount financed. A negative figure means the loan starts out larger than the price of the car, which is what financing the tax and fees, or carrying over debt from a trade-in, does.

One row for each year the loan runs: the principal repaid and the interest paid in that year, the balance owed and the car's estimated value at the year end, and the equity between them. Years the loan does not reach are blank rather than zero, and the last row is a part year when the term is not a whole number of years.

The last month of the loan in which the balance is still above the car's estimated value, counted from the first payment; 0 means it never is. From the month after it, the car is worth more than what is owed on it.