Opportunity Cost: Put a Number on What You Gave Up
Every time you invest, choosing one option means walking away from another. The return that option would have earned is called opportunity cost. Pick a savings account over a stock fund, and the fund's potential profit becomes your opportunity cost — invisible, yet a real gap in wealth over time.
This calculator takes the principal, time period, and expected return for two options and projects each one's profit with compound growth. Tell it which option you chose, and it shows how much more or less you earned versus the one you passed on. Return alone shouldn't drive the decision — stability, taxes, and liquidity matter too, so treat this as a reference estimate.
Frequently Asked Questions
It's the return you give up by choosing one option over another.
Not necessarily — stability, taxes, and liquidity matter too, so use it as one reference point.
Yes, future value uses compound growth based on your annual return rate and time period.