RealWorth is a free set of visual tools for understanding money. It starts with a historical inflation calculator and adds the context most calculators leave out: what a sum of money actually meant to the people who had it.
What it does
Enter an amount, pick a year and a country, and RealWorth shows its value today. Then it goes further. It shows how many weeks of an average wage that money represented, how many loaves of bread it bought, and how many months of rent it covered. A number like “$100 in 1920” stops being an abstraction and becomes something you can compare with your own life.
Who it’s for
Students and teachers of history and economics, writers and journalists who need historical price context, genealogy researchers looking at old wills and wages, and anyone who has wondered what a grandparent’s salary would be worth now.
Pricing & access
Everything is free. There’s no signup, no account, and no paywall. It works in any browser on desktop and mobile.
Key features
Inflation calculator for 6 countries (USA, UK, Germany, France, Canada, Japan), going back to 1750
Official data sources: BLS, Bank of England Millennium Dataset, Destatis, INSEE, Statistics Canada, and Japan’s Statistics Bureau, with methodology documented on the site
How Big Is a Billion Dollars: a billion turned into a road of $100 bills you scroll along
Anatomy of a $100 Bill: the note itself, broken down
Money Flow Map: the world’s largest remittance corridors, with a live counter of money sent home
Historical Rich-O-Meter: where a salary would have ranked in past decades
WealthMap: where your income ranks against today’s global medians
Global Income Rank Calculator: Compare your income with the world. See your global percentile, adjusted for local purchasing power.
Quick answers
Is RealWorth free?
Yes, fully free with no signup.
Where does the data come from?
From official national statistics: consumer price indexes published by each country’s statistics agency or central bank. Values before the 20th century use academic reconstructions, which the site notes.
How is it different from other inflation calculators?
Most return a single adjusted figure. RealWorth also shows what the money meant at the time, in wages, bread, and rent, and adds visual explainers that make large numbers easier to grasp.
Who builds it?
One independent developer, who maintains the data pipelines and tools.
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