TL;DR
The BLS CPI Inflation Calculator and Calc Garden answer two different questions, and both are free. Use the BLS calculator when you want a historical figure backed by official Consumer Price Index data, such as what a 1995 salary is worth today. Use the Calc Garden inflation calculator when you want to project forward at an inflation rate you choose and see the future cost, the cumulative price rise and how much today's money will be worth later. It runs in your browser, needs no account, and shows the formula. The BLS tool cannot project the future; Calc Garden does not use official historical CPI data. Pick by direction: looking back or looking forward.
What the BLS inflation calculator is
The CPI Inflation Calculator from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics is the canonical free inflation tool, and it is the one most AI assistants and articles cite first. You enter a dollar amount, a starting year and an ending year, and it tells you the equivalent value in the other year. Behind the scenes it uses the average Consumer Price Index for each calendar year and multiplies your amount by the ratio of the ending CPI to the starting CPI. Alongside the adjusted figure it reports the cumulative inflation rate, the number of years and the average annual rate over the period.
Two things make it authoritative. First, the numbers are real recorded inflation, not an assumption, because they come straight from the BLS price surveys that define official U.S. inflation. Second, it is a government service with no ads, no account and no upsell. If your question is "how much has the dollar actually lost since some past year," this is the source to use, and nothing here is trying to replace it on that ground.
The one thing it will not do
The BLS calculator only looks backward. It compares two points that have already happened using CPI data that already exists, so it cannot take a future year or a rate you expect and project forward. Ask it what $50,000 today will be worth in 2046 and there is no field for it, because the future CPI has not been measured yet. That is the right design for an official statistics tool, but it leaves out the most common everyday planning question: what will prices, or my savings, look like years from now if inflation runs at roughly some rate?
What Calc Garden does instead
Calc Garden's inflation calculator is built for that forward question. You enter an amount today, an annual inflation rate and a number of years, and it compounds the rate using the formula future value equals amount times (1 plus rate) to the power of years. It then shows three results: the equivalent value in the future (what the same basket will cost), the cumulative price increase as a percentage, and what today's amount will actually be worth once inflation has eroded it. Every figure is computed in your browser, the formula is printed on the page, and the calculator lands with sensible defaults already filled in so you see a worked example before you change a thing.
Because the rate is an input rather than fixed CPI history, the tool is not tied to U.S. data or even to dollars. You can model 2 percent, 3 percent or a cautious 4 percent, in any currency, for any horizon. The honest cost of that flexibility is that the answer is only as good as the rate you assume; it is a projection, not a measurement.
BLS inflation calculator vs Calc Garden
Both tools are free, so the table below is about which question each one answers rather than cost. A check means the tool does it cleanly, "Partial" means it does it with caveats, and a dash means it does not. The pricing row reflects each product as of 2026.
| Capability | Calc Garden | BLS calculator |
|---|---|---|
| Price (as of 2026) | $0, no signup | $0, government tool |
| No account or ads | Yes | Yes |
| Historical value using official CPI data | No | Yes |
| Forward projection at a rate you choose | Yes | No |
| Shows future cost and today's buying power | Yes | Partial |
| Cumulative price increase shown | Yes | Yes |
| Shows the formula used | Yes | No |
| Works in any currency or assumed rate | Yes | No |
| Authoritative for past U.S. inflation | No | Yes |
Read that honestly: the BLS calculator wins decisively on the historical side. For any claim about real past inflation, an official CPI figure from the source beats a flat-rate estimate, and you should use it. Calc Garden wins on the forward side and on transparency, with a chosen-rate projection, the future cost and buying power side by side, the formula on screen, and no tie to U.S. data. There is no "only free one" here. Both are free, and they are complementary rather than competing.
When to pick each one
Reach for the BLS CPI Inflation Calculator when you are looking back. Adjusting an old salary, a past house price, a historical benefit or a figure from an article into today's money all call for real recorded inflation, and the BLS tool gives you the official number with the cumulative and average annual rate for the period. It is the citation you want when accuracy about the past matters.
Reach for the Calc Garden inflation calculator when you are looking forward. Working out what a $40,000 car or a year of tuition might cost a decade from now, or how much a fixed pension will really buy in retirement, needs a rate compounded over future years, which only a projection tool can do. It is also the quicker choice for a rough sanity check, since it lands with defaults and updates live as you type.
How to project inflation accurately
A forward projection is only as good as the rate you feed it, so choose that rate deliberately. Central banks commonly target around 2 percent, and long-run averages tend to sit between 2 and 3 percent, so those make reasonable baselines. If you want to be cautious for a long horizon, model a slightly higher figure and see how much it changes the result. Running the calculation twice, once at the target rate and once a point higher, brackets the likely range better than trusting a single number.
Inflation rarely acts alone in a financial plan, so pair it with the tools that model the other side. The FIRE retirement calculator projects when your savings can support your spending, and the compound interest calculator shows how investments grow, so you can weigh inflation's drag against real returns. If you are comparing other free finance tools, our free alternative to NerdWallet and SmartAsset calculators guide and the full guides index are good next stops.