How to use the Cost of Living Comparator
What would your life cost in another city, and what would you need to earn there to save as much? Part 1 shows how to use the comparator and its Map View. Part 2 shows how every figure is worked out. Every demo is the real tool, running live in your browser. Press Pause on one to try it yourself.
The short version
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Pick your cities
A worked example from Quick Start, or a From city and a To city from 500+. The Map View sets your city against all of them.
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Enter your month
Your net salary and what you spend, as one figure or row by row: rent, groceries, eating out, utilities and more.
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Read the answer
What you would save there, or the net salary you need to earn there to save the same share of pay, or the same amount.
Nothing is uploaded. Every figure is worked out in your browser. This guide is general information, not financial advice.
The screen
Two pages on one dataset. The comparator sets one city beside one or a few others; the Map View sets it beside every city at once. Point at a part in a list to see where it is.
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The question
Quick Start, save and open, then Detail (Simple or Detailed), I can save or I need to earn, and housing in or out.
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Cities
From city and To city, searched by city, country or currency. ⇆ swaps them.
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Exchange rate
Shown when the two currencies differ: Custom FX Rate, and a slider for a move in the rate.
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The answer
One sentence, then both cities side by side: salary, expenses, savings and the savings ratio, a month.
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What this assumes
What the answer rests on for your cities, opened from its chevron.
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Inputs
Quick Start, save and open, then You, Compare by and Lifestyle. The chevrons fold the card to a slim Inputs rail.
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The map
Every city coloured against yours and labelled with the figure View picks. Zoom, home, world and major-city buttons on the right.
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Four figures
Your city, the cheapest and the dearest, and how many cities are cheaper. They change with the mode.
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Every city
A table of all 500+, with a search and ⬇ CSV, then What this assumes.
Top right on both pages, Tour replays a one minute walk through the page, and Guide opens this page.
Quick Start
Six worked examples, each a single professional's month in one home city, net of tax, against its neighbours: Singapore vs Australia, Southeast Asia, US cities, European capitals, Middle East and East Asia. One click opens the Detailed table on I need to earn.
On a phone, press Full screen under a demo and turn the phone sideways to read it.
Pick an example
Hover a button to read what it holds. A click replaces whatever was on screen.
Read the Net Income row
The net salary each destination needs to save the same share of pay as home: AUD 10,178 a month in Sydney, AUD 7,174 in Melbourne.
Each row, each city
Every expense row priced in each city, with what it comes to in the home currency, and the Savings row at the bottom.
- Round savings ratios. Each budget saves 20, 25, 30 or 40% of pay at home, so the target reads at a glance.
- Then make it yours. Type over any figure. The examples are a starting point, not a survey of what people earn.
Two cities, one month
Simple mode takes two cities and three figures: your net salary and your spending where you live, and a salary in the other city. It tells you which leaves more at the end of the month.
Pick two cities
Type in From city and To city and pick from the list. City, country or currency all match.
Enter your month
Net salary and Expenses, a month, after tax, in your currency. Each shows what it is worth in the other.
And a salary there
The net salary you would earn in the To city, in its currency.
Read the answer
The gap in monthly savings in both currencies, and the two savings ratios.
Swap them
⇆ turns it round. The salaries change sides, and your expenses become the estimate for the new home city.
- Estimated monthly expenses is your spending priced in the other city, for the same lifestyle: AUD 2,709 in Perth for IDR 12 million in Jakarta.
- Two ways to win. More money saved, or a bigger share of pay saved. The sentence says but when the two disagree.
What you need to earn
Switch the question to I need to earn and the To city's salary becomes the answer: the net salary that keeps your savings going after the same lifestyle there.
I need to earn
The To column now shows Required net monthly salary: AUD 4,515 for this example.
Pick the target
Savings ratio keeps the same share of pay; Nominal savings keeps the same amount, at today's rate: AUD 3,341.
Housing in or out
Exclude housing scales your spending by the index without rent, as when an employer pays for your home.
- A net salary. The answer is take-home pay. To compare it with a job offer, add the tax and social charges of the new country yourself.
- The two targets can be far apart. Moving to a dearer city, keeping the same share of pay asks for more than keeping the same amount. The reverse holds moving to a cheaper one. Part 2 shows why.
Exchange rates
Between two currencies a card opens under the cities. Money that crosses the border (your salary, your savings, the ≈ figures) moves at today's market rate. The cost estimate does not: shop prices in Perth do not change when the rupiah does.
The rate it uses
Default is today's rate from a free daily feed, or the bundled rate when the feeds cannot be reached.
Your own rate
Type the rate you would really get, after a bank's margin. The ≈ figures and the savings gap follow it.
What if AUD moves?
Move the destination currency up to 20% either way, on top of whichever rate is in force. Reset puts it back.
What does not move
Estimated monthly expenses stays AUD 2,709, and so does every savings ratio.
- ISO codes throughout. Every figure carries its currency's three-letter code, so AUD and USD never pass for each other.
- Rates are kept for six hours in your browser, then asked for again. A feed that disagrees five-fold with the bundled rate is ignored for that currency.
The Detailed table
Detailed mode splits your month into rows and prices each by its own index, in as many destinations as you like. The first column is home.
Add a city
+ City adds a destination column. The bin in its head takes it away.
Add a row
+ Add expense row, then pick its category: thirteen, from rent to remittances. Each ? says how it is priced.
Type over an estimate
Know the rent you would pay? Type it. The cell turns yellow and replaces the estimate; clear it to go back.
Read the answer
Net Income at the top, Savings and its ratio at the bottom, per city.
At a custom frequency
Enter a row per week, fortnight or year, or as a price times a count: per meal, kWh, litre, gallon or trip. Everything is turned into a month.
Move a column
Drag ⠿ to reorder the cities. The city that lands first becomes home, and every figure keeps its value.
- FX Rate (custom). A row of its own, one rate per destination in another currency. In this table it does more than in Simple mode; see Exchange rates in Part 2.
- No data in a cell means the dataset lacks that index for that city. Type your own figure and the totals come back.
Save, open and what it assumes
Each page keeps your comparison in this browser between visits. To keep it elsewhere, save it to a file.
Save or open a file
The two icons at the end of the Quick Start row write every input to a file, and read one back.
What this assumes
The last card, opened from its chevron: the index, the salaries, the target and the rate this answer rests on.
- The Map View saves the same way, and its ⬇ CSV writes every city's figures in both currencies.
Same inputs, two screens
The Map View runs the comparator's own sums on the same fields, against every city at once. Point at a field in the list to see it on both.
Your city
From city on one, Your city on the other. Its currency leads every figure.
Net salary
Take-home pay, a month, in your currency.
Your spending
Expenses or Living cost: one figure in Simple, a row per category in Detailed.
Housing
Include or exclude it, Simple only on both.
Detail
Simple or Detailed.
The question
I need to earn is the Map's Required. The Map adds Global and Scaled.
Target
Savings ratio or Nominal savings, for the required salary.
| Comparator | Map View | What differs |
|---|---|---|
| From city | Your city | The Map has no To city: every other city is a destination. |
| Net salary; Net Income in Detailed | Net salary | None. A month, after tax. |
| Expenses; the expense rows in Detailed | Living cost; the expense rows in Detailed | The same thirteen categories and the same estimate. The Map has no typed-over cells and no custom frequency. |
| As part of my expenses: Include or Exclude housing | Housing: Include or Exclude | None. Simple only on both. |
| Detail: Simple or Detailed | Lifestyle, Detail: Simple or Detailed | On the comparator, Detailed also brings several destinations. |
| I want to know how much: I need to earn, I can save | Salary: Required, Global, Scaled | Required is I need to earn. Global is I can save with your own salary converted to each city. Scaled has no counterpart. |
| Target: Savings ratio or Nominal savings | Target | None. Shown with I need to earn, or Required. |
| Net salary in the To city | None | Global uses your own salary everywhere; Scaled pays each city the same multiple of its local pay. |
| Custom FX Rate, What if AUD moves? | None | The Map always converts at today's market rate. |
- What it adds. Every city at once on a world map, ranked and coloured, and two more ways to set the salary there: your own (Global), or the same multiple of local pay (Scaled).
- What it holds fixed. The sums. Perth on AUD 6,500 spending AUD 4,550 with housing needs AUD 7,189 in Sydney on both pages; the Map's own audit checks every city against the comparator.
The Map View
Open it from the link under the comparator's header. Six Quick Starts fill a home city's month row by row and fly the map there.
Open the inputs
On a first visit the card is folded to a rail, so the map has the room. Click Inputs to open it.
Pick an example
Singapore, Jakarta, Perth, New York, London or Dubai.
Read the map
Blue is cheaper than home, amber dearer, deepest at the extremes. Point at a city for its card: Melbourne needs AUD 5,348.
The four figures
Your city, the cheapest, the dearest, and how many of the 546 cities cost less than yours.
Required
The net salary each city needs for your lifestyle and your Target, as on the comparator.
Global
Your own salary in every city, at today's rate. Red triangles mark cities where it does not cover your lifestyle.
Scaled
The same multiple of local pay: Scale by the Min. wage, the Average or the Median net salary.
Change the view
View labels the map with the salary, Living cost, Nominal savings or Savings ratio.
Detailed: a row each
A Quick Start fills a row per category. Change one and the total and the map follow.
Simple: one figure
Living cost holds the same month as one figure, scaled by the city's overall index.
Housing in or out
As on the comparator: the overall index with rent, or without it.
Point at a city
Its card gives every figure in your currency and its own. Tap on a phone; the card stays until you close it.
Zoom and move
Drag to move; click the map, then scroll to zoom. The buttons zoom, fly back to your city, or show the whole world.
Major cities only
The funnel keeps capitals, each country's largest city and any of a million people or more.
Full screen
The blue ⤢ fills the screen with the map. Esc or the same button puts it back.
Every city
Every city opens from its chevron. Search it, click a row to fly there, or ⬇ CSV.
- The colour is one number: the city's living cost in your currency against yours. It does not change with the view, so a city keeps its colour as you switch from salary to savings.
- No estimate (a hollow dot) means the dataset lacks an index your lifestyle needs there, or Scaled has no pay figure for it.
How the numbers work
What each field means, where it enters the sums, and what moving it does to the answer and why. All of it is read from the tool's own code (script.js, copied function for function into the Map View's).
The model in one picture
The tool never prices your life from scratch. It takes what you spend now and scales it by how much dearer or cheaper each kind of spending is in the other city, according to a price index. Then it asks what salary there keeps your savings target.
- xiwhat you spend on row i at home (one row in Simple)
- Id,i, Ih,ithat row's price index there and at home
- ed, ehunits of each currency per US dollar, at the rate the indices were priced at
- Ehyour spending at home, the sum of xi
- Shyour Net salary at home
- ryour savings ratio now, (Sh − Eh) ÷ Sh
- Xtoday's market rate, home currency per 1 of the destination's
- The exchange rate cancels out of the cost. Each index is a city's prices in US dollars over a base city's, so e × I is a city's prices in its own currency. Ed is a ratio of local prices: it does not move with today's exchange rate.
- On the savings ratio target, the answer is your salary times one ratio: what your basket costs there over what it costs you now. How much you spend drops out; only the mix of rows matters.
- On the nominal target, the amount you save is carried across the border at today's rate, so the exchange rate and your spending level both count.
I can save skips the last step: you type the salary there, and savings are Sd − Ed. The sentence compares that with your savings at home converted at X, and the two ratios.
The question: Detail, goal and housing
The row of toggles at the top decides which index prices your spending and which figure is the answer.
- Cthe cost-of-living index with housing, or without it when housing is excluded
| Field | What it is | In the maths | Raise it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Detail | Simple: your month as one figure. Detailed: a row per category, and several destinations. | Simple prices Eh by the overall index C. Detailed prices each row by its own index and adds them up. | a mode |
| I want to know how much | I can save: you give the salary there. I need to earn: the tool works it out. | Save: savings = Sd − Ed. Earn: Sd from the Target. | a mode |
| As part of my expenses | Include housing or Exclude housing, as when an employer pays for it. Simple only. | Picks C: the index with rent, or the one without. Your Expenses figure should match: with rent in it, or not. | swaps the index |
| At a custom frequency | Each row per week, fortnight, month or year, or a unit price times a count. Detailed only. | Every amount × its months factor: a week is 52 ÷ 12; a price is × count × periods a month. A switch restates the amount, so the money never changes. | no effect on the answer |
Watch out: housing changes the index, not your figure. Excluding housing does not take rent out of your Expenses. If your figure still holds rent, it is scaled by an index without rent, which understates a move to a city where rent is dear.
Cities, categories and the index
Each city has a set of price indices from a crowd-sourced survey (updated May 2026), rebased to Perth = 100. The base cancels in every ratio, so it never shows. A row follows the index of its category.
- Pcthe basket's price in city c, in its own currency
- ecunits of its currency per US dollar when the survey priced it
| Field | What it is | In the maths | Raise it |
|---|---|---|---|
| From city | Where you live and spend now. Its currency leads every figure. | Ih and eh in every row. | a dearer home: ▼ cost there |
| To city, or a destination | Where you might move. Detailed takes several. | Id and ed. | a dearer city: ▲ salary needed |
| Category | What a row is spent on (Detailed). | Picks the index Ii for the row, as in the table below. | swaps the index |
| Category | Priced by | Note |
|---|---|---|
| 🏠 Rent | The median rent index | Usually the row that moves most between cities. |
| 🛒 Groceries, 🍽️ Eating Out | Their own indices | Eating out swings more than groceries: it carries local wages. |
| ⚡ Utilities | The 50/20/30 blend above | A ! beside the cell says a part was missing and reweighted. |
| 💡 Electricity, 💧 Water, 🔥 Gas, ⛽ Fuel | Each one's median index | Use one of these instead of Utilities to price a bill on its own. |
| 🩺 Medical Care, 🛡️ Health Insurance | The health index above | The same care and cover; public schemes paid through tax are left out. |
| 💸 Remittance, ✈️ International Travel | No index: the exchange rate alone | Converted at the rate the indices were priced at, or your custom rate. |
| 🌐 Other | The cost-of-living index without housing | Everything else. |
- Purchasing power, done properly. Because the rate cancels, the estimate compares what the same goods cost in each place in local money. That is a purchasing-power comparison, not a currency conversion. The survey's own local purchasing power index is in the file but no figure uses it.
Your month: salary, spending and the target
Your salary and spending set your savings ratio. The target says which part of it you want to keep.
| Field | What it is | In the maths | Raise it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Net salary (home), Net Income | Your take-home pay, a month (or the period you pick). | Sh, and through it r. | ratio target: ▲ salary needed, one for onenominal: ▲ by the extra savings |
| Expenses, or the expense rows | What you spend at home in a month, rent included unless you exclude housing. | xi and Eh: the cost there, and r. | ratio target: only the mix countsnominal: ▲ salary needed |
| Net salary (To city) | A salary you are offered there (I can save). | Sd typed: savings and ratio there. | ▲ savings there |
| A typed-over cell | Your own figure for a row in a destination (Detailed, yellow). | Replaces that row's estimate in Ed. | ▲ salary needed |
| Target | Savings ratio: the same share of pay. Nominal savings: the same amount. | Ratio: Sd = Ed ÷ (1 − r). Nominal: Sd = Ed + (Sh − Eh) ÷ X. | a mode |
- Why the two targets part ways. In a city twice as dear, keeping a 25% ratio means saving twice as much in money; keeping the amount means saving a smaller share. Moving somewhere cheaper, the ratio target asks for less than the nominal one.
- No single answer when you save 100% of pay, or spend nothing there: any salary keeps that ratio, so the cell shows a dash with a tip.
Watch out: saving more at home raises the bar. On the ratio target, a pay rise you save lifts the salary you need elsewhere by the same 10%: you are asking the new city to fund the same higher share.
Exchange rates
Two rates, two jobs. The rate the indices were priced at turns an index ratio into a ratio of local prices. Today's market rate, X, carries money across the border: the ≈ figures, the savings gap, the nominal target and every home-currency figure on the Map.
| Field | What it is | In the maths | Raise it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Default | Today's rate from a free daily feed, kept six hours; the bundled May 2026 rate when no feed answers. | X, when you give no rate of your own. | not a field |
| Custom FX Rate | 1 To-city unit = this many home units: the rate you would really get. | Simple: X only, never the estimate. Detailed: X, and it also replaces ed ÷ eh in that column's estimates. | nominal: ▼ salary needed thereDetailed: ▼ every estimate in the column |
| What if AUD moves? | A move in the destination currency's strength, on top of the rate in force. Simple only. | × (1 + p) on X. It never touches the estimate. | ratio target: no effectnominal: ▼ salary needed in AUD |
- Local prices are sticky; exchange rates are not. A weaker rupiah does not reprice a Perth lunch in dollars, or a Jakarta lunch in rupiah. It only changes how many rupiah the Perth lunch costs an Indonesian.
- The ratio target is immune. Its salary and the costs it covers are both in the destination's currency, so no rate enters it. Only the ≈ home-currency figure moves.
Watch out: in the Detailed table a custom rate reprices the estimates. Singapore to Sydney, a rate of 1 AUD = 1.00 SGD instead of 0.91 cuts the Sydney rent estimate from AUD 4,577 to AUD 4,185 and the salary needed from AUD 10,178 to AUD 9,306. Simple mode keeps the estimate on the priced-at rate, whatever rate you type.
The Map View: three ways to set the salary
The Map works out Ed for every city exactly as above, then sets the salary there one of three ways. Every figure is shown in your currency (× X) first, and in the city's own after it.
- Wa city's pay yardstick, a month in its own currency
- qliving cost in your currency over yours; below 1 is blue, above amber
| Field | What it is | In the maths | Raise it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Salary: Required | The salary each city needs for your lifestyle and Target. | The comparator's two formulas. On the ratio target, required salary in your currency is Sh × q. | a mode |
| Salary: Global | Your salary taken to every city, like a remote job paid at home. | Sh ÷ X; a city falls short where q passes Sh ÷ Eh. | a mode |
| Salary: Scaled | The same place in the local pay scale: a job paid like a local's. | Sh ÷ Wh × Wd. Your city keeps your salary exactly. | a mode |
| Scale by | Min. wage, Average or Median net salary. | W. Minimum wages are gross, full-time; averages come from the survey's purchasing power and cost indices; a median is the average × the country's median-to-average earnings ratio. | swaps the yardstick |
| Target | As on the comparator, Required only. | Picks the Required formula. | a mode |
| View | The figure on the labels, metrics and title. | None: the colour stays q. Required on the ratio target hides Savings ratio, the same everywhere. | display only |
Watch out: a minimum wage is gross, your salary net. Scaling a net salary by gross minimum wages flatters a country that taxes low pay hard. The tool says so in What this assumes.
Worked examples
Figures from the Quick Starts, with the rates bundled with the tool (22 May 2026): AUD 1.40, SGD 1.28 and CHF 0.7847 per US dollar.
Singapore vs Australia: the salary Sydney needs
SGD 8,000 a month net, SGD 6,000 spent in five rows, saving 25%. Each row is scaled by its own index, Sydney over Singapore.
- Priced-at rate1.40 AUD ÷ 1.28 SGD per US dollar1.09375
- RentSGD 3,500 × 1.09375 × 130.8 ÷ 109.4AUD 4,577
- GroceriesSGD 600 × 1.09375 × 101.4 ÷ 99.0AUD 672
- Eating outSGD 700 × 1.09375 × 97.7 ÷ 75.1AUD 996
- UtilitiesSGD 200 × 1.09375 × 93.68 ÷ 62.25. Sydney: 0.5 × 97.0 + 0.2 × 90.9 + 0.3 × 90.0; Singapore: 0.5 × 99.4 + 0.2 × 39.8 + 0.3 × 15.3AUD 329
- OtherSGD 1,000 × 1.09375 × 102.0 ÷ 105.3AUD 1,059
- Cost there, Ed4,577 + 672 + 996 + 329 + 1,059AUD 7,634
- Savings ratio, r(8,000 − 6,000) ÷ 8,00025%
- Net salary needed7,634 ÷ (1 − 0.25), or 8,000 × 7,634 ÷ 6,000. The tool's Net Income for Sydney: AUD 10,178AUD 10,178 a month
- Rent is 58% of this budget and 60% of the answer. Sydney rent is 20% dearer than Singapore's on the index, eating out 30% dearer; groceries and other spending barely differ.
- On the nominal target it is AUD 7,634 + SGD 2,000 ÷ 0.9143 = AUD 9,821: keeping the amount you save asks less than keeping the share.
The Map View: Perth to Zurich, three ways
The Perth Quick Start: AUD 6,500 net, AUD 4,550 spent in six rows (rent 2,400, groceries 600, eating out 400, utilities 250, fuel 250, other 650), saving 30%. Today's rate in the demo: 1 CHF = AUD 1.784.
- Cost in Zurich, EdEach row × 0.7847 ÷ 1.40 × Zurich's index ÷ Perth's 100: rent 144.1, groceries 156.1, eating out 152.7, utilities 157.3, fuel 183.2, other 147.9CHF 3,822
- Colour, qCHF 3,822 × 1.784 ÷ AUD 4,550: 50% dearer than Perth1.50
- RequiredCHF 3,822 ÷ (1 − 0.30), or AUD 6,500 × 1.50CHF 5,460 (AUD 9,741)
- GlobalAUD 6,500 ÷ 1.784 = CHF 3,643, less CHF 3,822 spentshort CHF 178 (AUD 318)
- Scaled, by the averageAUD 6,500 ÷ Perth's average AUD 6,173 = 1.05×; × Zurich's average CHF 6,818 = CHF 7,180, less CHF 3,822saves CHF 3,358 (46.8%)
- Three answers, three questions. Zurich needs half as much again to live as you do; your own pay would not cover it; but a Zurich job paying what yours does in Perth, relative to local pay, would save almost half of it.
When a ratio of indices misleads
An index prices a typical shopper's basket. Yours is not typical, and the gap shows most in rent.
The same Singapore to Sydney month, three ways
SGD 8,000 net, SGD 6,000 spent, saving 25%. Only the way the spending is priced changes.
- Simple, without housingSGD 6,000 × 1.09375 × 102.0 ÷ 105.3, ÷ 0.75AUD 8,476
- Simple, with housingSGD 6,000 × 1.09375 × 110.6 ÷ 106.5, ÷ 0.75AUD 9,087
- Detailed, five rowsThe worked example aboveAUD 10,178
- The overall index weights rent like a typical household. This budget puts 58% into rent, and Sydney's rent index is 20% above Singapore's while the overall index with housing is only 4% above. Simple mode misses AUD 1,091 a month.
- A city is not one price. The rent index is a median across a city's neighbourhoods. Your street may sit far from it.
- Prices are not choices. The estimate keeps your lifestyle fixed. People who move change it: they cook more where eating out is dear, or rent smaller where rent is. The answer is the cost of not adapting.
- A survey, not a census. The indices are crowd-sourced and thin in some cities. Where you know a real figure, type it over the estimate.
Use Detailed with your own rent as a row whenever rent is a large or unusual share of your month.
What moves the answer
Each input moved on its own, from the Singapore vs Australia base case, on the tool's own engine.
- Net Income in SingaporeSGD 8,000 → 7,200 / 8,800−AUD 1,017+AUD 1,018
- Sydney prices, every rowthe estimates −10% / +10%−AUD 1,017+AUD 1,018
- Sydney rentAUD 4,577 → 4,119 / 5,035−AUD 610+AUD 611
- Other in SingaporeSGD 1,000 → 900 / 1,100+AUD 29−AUD 28
- Singapore rentSGD 3,500 → 3,150 / 3,850−AUD 17+AUD 16
- Eating out in SingaporeSGD 700 → 630 / 770−AUD 14+AUD 14
- Your spending, every rowSGD 6,000 → 5,400 / 6,600AUD 0AUD 0
- Exchange rateSGD per AUD −10% / +10%AUD 0AUD 0
Read it from the top: the longest bar is the input your answer rests on most. The Singapore rows move your spending with your salary held, so your savings ratio moves too. Measured by guides/_sensitivity.mjs.
- Two things decide it: your pay and how right the prices there are. Each moves the answer one for one. Of the prices, rent is the piece worth checking: a 10% error in the Sydney rent is AUD 610 a month.
- How much you spend does not matter on this target. Spend 10% more at home and you save less, so the share to keep falls by just enough. Only the mix moves it: more on a row dearer in Sydney (rent, eating out) lifts it a little, more on a cheaper one (other) lowers it.
- The exchange rate does not touch it. Every figure in this answer is in Australian dollars, priced in Australian shops. On the nominal target it would: AUD 9,821 becomes AUD 10,064 with the Singapore dollar 10% stronger, and AUD 9,622 with it 10% weaker.
- So for a decision: negotiate on the salary needed, but check the rent you would really pay before you trust it, and remember the answer is net of tax.
The base case
SGD 8,000 net, saving 25%: Sydney needs AUD 10,178.
Salary up 10%
SGD 8,800, spending unchanged, now saving 31.8%. Every destination needs 10% more: Sydney AUD 11,196.
Salary down 10%
SGD 7,200, saving 16.7%. Sydney needs AUD 9,161.
Rent up 10%, salary back
SGD 3,850 rent on SGD 8,000: you save less, so the bar barely moves. Sydney AUD 10,194.
What it leaves out
What the answer rests on, beyond the figures you enter. What this assumes, under the results, lists the ones your comparison uses.
- No tax. Salaries are net, as you type them. Nothing grosses a salary up through income tax or social charges, so a required salary is take-home pay, not an offer.
- One lifestyle, fixed. No household size, no lifestyle level, no change of habits on arrival. A family is priced as whatever its month already costs.
- Prices from a survey. Crowd-sourced indices, updated May 2026; health care from the World Bank ICP 2021 by country. A city lacking an index shows no estimate rather than a guess.
- One month, today. No inflation from here, no change in rents or rates over time, no one-off costs of moving, deposits or visas.
- Public services left out. Schooling, health cover and transport paid through tax differ widely; the tool prices only what you pay directly.
- Exchange rates from a free feed, with no bank margin unless you type your own rate.
- Scaled pay is rough. Average salaries are crowd-sourced; a median comes from one national ratio; minimum wages are gross.
Do not lean on it when rent is a big share of your month and you have not typed your own, you compare gross offers, your household will change with the move, or the city's figures come from a thin survey.
This guide and the tool are general information, not financial advice. Check the figures that matter to you before you accept an offer or move.
Ready to compare your own?
Open the tool Or set your city against the world in the Map View