Live tool · Official BLS & Federal Reserve data
The Live Inflation Clock
Inflation does not arrive once a month. It runs every second. Enter an amount and watch its buying power drain in real time, at the rate the official data says prices are actually climbing.
Running at 3.30% inflation a yearCPI-U, 12-month
Your $10,000.00, losing value as you watch
$10,000.00000Your money keeps its number. Its buying power does not. The clock starts at your full amount and counts down from the moment you arrived, at the rate prices are currently running. Live as of today · Extrapolated from the most recent official data.
Clock settings
Cash, a savings balance, a salary, a house price. Anything whose number stays fixed while prices move.
Which inflation rate should the clock run at?
There is no single "the" inflation rate. Each of these is an official measure of a different thing. The headline CPI-U rate is the default; the short-window rates react faster to what prices are doing right now.
Negative rates model deflation: the clock reverses and counts buying power gained.
CPI-U, 12-month
The headline U.S. inflation rate: the change in the Consumer Price Index over the last twelve months.
Measured from July 2025 to July 2026.
Source: BLS CPI-U (CPIAUCSL via FRED)
Latest CPI-U index: 332.813 (July 2026), 1982-84 = 100.
What inflation takes, per unit of time
Every row is the same annual rate, compounded over a different interval. The per-second figure is small enough to ignore and large enough that, repeated 31,557,600 times, it becomes the per-year figure at the bottom.
| Interval | Buying power lost | Share of the amount |
|---|
How this clock works
A published rate, compounded down to the second
Inflation is measured monthly, not continuously. The Bureau of Labor Statistics prices a basket of goods and publishes the Consumer Price Index once a month, weeks after the fact. So no clock anywhere can tell you what prices did in the last second: that number does not exist yet, and will not for weeks.
What this clock does instead is honest and useful. It takes the most recent official rate, treats it as the pace prices are currently running at, and spreads it across time by compounding. A fixed amount of money A has the buying power of A ÷ (1 + r)t after t years at annual rate r, so the value lost over any interval is A × (1 − (1 + r)−t).
That compounding matters. Dividing 3.3% of $10,000 evenly across a year would say inflation costs you $330. It does not: it costs $319.46, because each moment's loss applies to money that has already shrunk slightly. Add up the per-second figure on this page 31,557,600 times and you land exactly on the per-year figure. A straight-line clock would not.
Why the big number keeps moving
The main readout starts at exactly the amount you entered and falls from the moment the clock starts, so resetting it, or typing a new amount, puts it back on a round number and begins again. The rate it falls at is the current one, extrapolated to this moment from the most recent official release: the data is monthly, the decay is continuous.
The second odometer answers a different question: how much this amount has already lost since the data behind the rate was published. That figure does not reset, because that time has genuinely passed.
Which rate to trust
The 12-month CPI-U change is the headline number, the one quoted in the news, and the default here. It is also slow: it averages in prices from a year ago. The 3-month annualized rate is the same index read over a shorter window, so it turns faster when inflation shifts. Core CPI and the PCE price index strip out food and energy or reweight the basket, and are what the Federal Reserve actually watches. Cleveland Fed expected inflation is the odd one out: it is a forecast, not a measurement.
Every rate on this page carries the observation it ends on and the observation it is measured from. Figures are projections from published data, not official statistics, and nothing here is financial advice. Methodology · Report a correction.
Keep going
Inflation loss calculator · Inflation calculator by year · Dollar purchasing power since 1913 · What purchasing power actually means · All live clocks
Questions
Live inflation clock FAQ
Is there a live inflation clock?
Yes, this one. It takes the latest official U.S. inflation rate, extrapolates it to right now, compounds it down to the second, and applies it to any amount you enter. Inflation itself is not measured second by second; prices are surveyed monthly, so the clock projects the most recent published rate forward rather than measuring the last second.
What does the reset button do?
It puts the clock back to exactly the amount you entered and starts the count again from that moment. Typing a new amount or picking a preset does the same thing. The figure for what your amount has lost since the last official CPI reading does not reset, because that time has genuinely passed.
How much does inflation cost me per second?
At 3.3% annual inflation, $10,000 loses about $0.0000103 of buying power per second, $0.037 per hour, $0.89 per day, $6.22 per week, $27.02 per month, and $319.46 per year. Enter your own amount above to see your figures.
What data does the clock use?
Every rate comes from an official source: CPI-U and Core CPI from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the PCE price index from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, and one-year expected inflation from the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, all retrieved through FRED. Each option shows its own as-of date and measurement window.
Why is the per-second figure not the annual rate divided by seconds?
Because inflation compounds. The clock uses loss = amount × (1 − (1 + rate)−t), where t is the interval as a fraction of a year. Splitting 3.3% of $10,000 evenly would say $330 a year; the compounding figure is $319.46, and it is the one that adds back up correctly from seconds to a full year.
Which inflation rate is the best estimate right now?
The 12-month CPI-U change is the official headline rate and the default. For where inflation is running at this moment, the 3-month annualized rate reacts faster. Core CPI and the PCE price index are what the Federal Reserve watches, and Cleveland Fed expected inflation looks forward rather than back.
Does the clock work for deflation?
Yes. Enter a negative custom rate and the clock reverses: the readout turns green and counts buying power gained rather than lost. If an official series ever prints a negative annual rate, the clock handles it the same way.
How long until my money is worth half as much?
At 3.3% inflation, money loses half its buying power in about 21.3 years. At the Federal Reserve's 2% target it takes about 35 years, and at 5% about 14.2 years. The clock shows this figure for whichever rate you select.
Is this financial advice?
No. This is an educational tool built on public data. It projects a published inflation rate forward and cannot predict what inflation will actually do.