The Best Retirement Planning Apps

Reviewed by Chip StapletonReviewed by Chip Stapleton

Developing a retirement strategy can be burdensome. Fortunately, there are many tools that make planning for retirement easier. They come with advice, goals, and progress reports at your fingertips.

Key Takeaways

• There are many online tools and apps that can make planning for retirement easier.
• Although all of these apps are designed with retirement planning in mind, each provides different services and methods for reaching that goal.
• It’s worth it to keep searching until you find the tool that meets your needs.

Here’s an overview of some of the best retirement planning apps that are available now.

1. Retirement Planner

This free Android app is a useful tool when you are in the midst of making choices about how to structure your retirement savings. This app allows you to compare projections for investing in a 401(k), Roth 401(k), Roth IRA, or traditional IRA.

Retirement Planner also shows how saving today will impact your retirement income in the future. It allows you to see if you are on track to reach your retirement goals or if you should reevaluate your long-term plan.

Important

A retirement app can be useful, but if you have questions about your retirement portfolio, it may be wise to consult a financial professional.

2. Social Security Planner

This app is available for free online from Financial Engines. It requires you to answer a fairly simple set of questions, then gives you recommendations for ways to maximize your Social Security benefits.

The app is designed to take some of the guesswork out of when to start claiming benefits, and is ideal for those who have a bit of flexibility in this regard. It’s often a balancing act: should you wait to claim a higher benefit, or claim benefits sooner, to have more years of Social Security income? The app can help you answer this question, and more.

3. Retirement Outlook Estimator

This simple online or free iOS app adds a bit of charm to the retirement planning process. Once basic information is entered, the app provides you with a “weather report” analysis of your savings plan—your outlook may be rainy, cloudy, partly cloudy, or sunny—along with expected dollar amounts for retirement income.

This app also provides you with suggestions about how your outlook will change if you invest more or less per year.

What Was Vanguard’s Retirement Nest Egg Calculator?

This free online app, which is no longer available, was designed for people who are nearing or who have entered retirement, to help determine if their portfolio will cover expenditures for the number of years they expect to be retired. It was statistically rigorous and used a Monte Carlo analysis to determine if the user’s retirement savings and portfolio will or will not be sufficient to last for the length of their retirement.

What Was the Retirement Goal Planning System?

This free iPad app, which is no longer available, used behavioral economics to help you understand your own preferences when dealing with the complex problem of planning for retirement. It broke down the problem into “thinking steps.” It allowed you to build a personalized set of retirement goals, which you then could use to craft your own retirement plan or share with a financial planner.

What was ING’s Struct app?

This app, which is no longer available, was unique because it was structured as a game. The goal of the Struct game was to learn the concepts of risk, diversification, goal-setting, and long-term progress. The elements of the game represented investments in cash, bonds, and stocks, and the player could choose to play as a conservative, moderate, or risk-loving investor.

This app helped players understand the concepts behind retirement planning. It also helped players determine the types of investments and risks they’re interested in making for their financial futures.

The Bottom Line

There are many apps that can help you plan for retirement. From Social Security estimators to apps that help you determine your priorities, from rigorous statistics to simple graphs—there’s an app for everyone’s planning style. It’s worth it to keep searching until you find the tool that meets your needs.

Read the original article on Investopedia.