Bi-Weekly Savings Plan: How Much to Save Each Payday

If you’re paid every two weeks, you get 26 paychecks a year. A bi-weekly savings plan picks one amount, moves it into savings on each of those paydays, and leaves it alone. The hardest part is choosing the number, so start there.

Three ways to pick your number

There’s no single right amount. Pick the method below that fits how you think about money, and adjust once you’ve lived with it for a month or two.

Start from a goal

Decide what you’re saving for and divide by the number of paydays you have to get there.

Say you want a $1,000 starter emergency fund within a year. That’s $1,000 divided by 26 paydays, or about $38.46. Round up to $40 per paycheck and you’ll have $1,040 by the end of the year.

Or say you want $780 set aside for the holidays and you have 13 paydays until then. That’s $60 per paycheck.

Rounding up to an even number makes it easier to remember, and the extra gives you a little cushion.

Start from a percentage

If you don’t have a specific goal yet, save a set share of each paycheck.

Here’s a hypothetical example. Your take-home pay is $1,800 per paycheck. Saving 5% means $90 each payday, which comes to $2,340 over 26 paydays. Saving 10% means $180 each payday, or $4,680 over the year.

If you use the 50/30/20 budget, the 20% slice covers both savings and extra debt payments, so your savings percentage might be smaller while you’re paying something down.

Start from what’s left over

Pull up your last two months of bank statements and find the smallest amount you had left in checking right before a payday. That’s money you were able to live without, even in a tight stretch.

Plan to save about half of it. If your lowest leftover was $120, start with $60 per paycheck. You leave yourself breathing room, and you can raise it later.

What each amount adds up to

Here’s what a steady amount per paycheck turns into, before any interest your savings account pays:

Per payday	6 months (13 paydays)	1 year (26 paydays)
$25	$325	$650
$50	$650	$1,300
$75	$975	$1,950
$100	$1,300	$2,600
$150	$1,950	$3,900

Even the top row is a real cushion. $650 can cover a car repair or a surprise vet bill that would otherwise go on a credit card.

Set it up so it happens without you

A savings plan you have to remember every other Friday is one you’ll skip when the week is busy. Automate it instead.

• Ask about splitting your direct deposit. Many employers let you send part of each paycheck to a second account, so the savings never lands in checking.
• If that isn’t an option, schedule an automatic transfer for payday. If your deposit sometimes shows up late, set it for the day after.
• Keep savings in a separate account, ideally at a different bank from your checking. When it isn’t sitting right there in your banking app, you’re less likely to dip into it.
• Rename the account after the goal, like “Emergency Fund” or “Christmas.” Seeing the name makes it harder to treat as spare cash.

If you’re still building the rest of your budget around your pay schedule, this guide to a bi-weekly budget walks through how to assign bills to each paycheck.

Plan for the months with three paychecks

Most monthly budgets are built on two paychecks a month, which covers 24 paydays. The other two arrive in months that happen to have three paydays, and in most years there are two of those months.

If your bills are already covered by the first two checks of the month, that third check is mostly free to go toward goals. Look up which months it lands in this year and decide now what it’s for, before it shows up and disappears into regular spending.

One hypothetical way to split a $1,800 third paycheck:

• $900 to savings
• $500 to a debt or an upcoming bill, like car insurance
• $400 for something fun or a slightly bigger grocery haul

Your split will look different depending on what’s going on that year. A family with a credit card balance might send most of it to the card, while someone with no emergency fund might put all of it in savings.

Try a step-up savings challenge

If saving the same amount every time feels a little dull, a bi-weekly savings challenge raises it slowly. You save a small amount on your first payday and add the same small step every payday after.

Two versions:

• In $5 steps, you save $5 on the first payday, $10 on the second, and so on up to $130 on the 26th. That adds up to $1,755 over the year.
• In $10 steps, you start at $10 and finish at $260 on the last payday, for $3,510 total.

The catch is that the end gets heavy. If your 26th payday falls in December, finding $260 during the holidays may be hard. Some people get around this by running it in reverse, saving the biggest amounts first while they’re motivated. Another option is to use a chart and cross off any amount you like on each payday, picking a bigger one when money is less tight.

The free Bi-Weekly Savings Challenge comes with a printable tracker and a Google Sheet that works out what to set aside each payday, so you don’t have to do the math yourself.

Split your savings into buckets

Once the habit is in place, you might want your savings to cover more than one goal. You can split each transfer into a few buckets, sometimes called sinking funds.

For example, if you save $100 per paycheck:

• $50 to your emergency fund
• $25 to car costs like registration, tires, and repairs
• $25 to holidays and birthdays

Many online banks let you open several savings accounts or label separate “buckets” inside one account. If yours doesn’t, a simple tracking sheet works fine.

If you’re starting from zero, it’s usually worth building the emergency fund first, since it keeps a surprise bill from going on a card.

When a paycheck comes up short

Some paychecks will be smaller than you planned for, because of fewer hours, an unpaid day off, or a big bill landing in the same week. On those paydays, lower the amount instead of skipping it. Saving $10 keeps the habit going, and the transfer still happens on schedule.

When a paycheck is bigger than usual, from overtime or a bonus, consider sending part of the extra to savings before it blends into your regular spending.

Check in every few months

Put a reminder on your calendar to look at your plan every three months. It only takes a few minutes. Ask yourself:

• Is the amount still comfortable, or has it been a stretch every time?
• Did you get a raise? If so, bump your savings by part of it before you get used to the bigger check.
• Did you pay off a debt? That monthly payment can go straight to savings.
• Is it time to add a new goal or bucket?

If you’d like more ways to keep it interesting, the Savings Challenge Pack has fifteen printable challenges, each with its own Google Sheet, and this roundup of savings challenges covers options for every paycheck size.