Percentage Increase Calculator

What is a percentage change calculator?

A percentage change calculator tells you by what percent a value has gone up or down between two points. Enter the old value and the new value, and the calculator shows the percentage increase or percentage decrease, the absolute change, the multiplier, the percentage difference and – if you add the number of years – the average yearly growth. It works as a percentage increase calculator, a percentage decrease calculator and a percentage gain/loss calculator for stocks, crypto, prices, salary and rent.

What is percentage increase?

Percentage increase is the rise in a value expressed as a percentage of the starting value. If a salary goes from ₹50,000 to ₹56,500, it has risen by ₹6,500, which is 13% of the original ₹50,000. Percentage decrease is the same idea for a fall: a phone that drops from ₹20,000 to ₹17,000 has fallen by 15%.

How to calculate percentage increase or decrease

1. Subtract the old value from the new value to get the change.
2. Divide the change by the old value.
3. Multiply by 100. A positive answer is a percentage increase; a negative answer is a percentage decrease.

Percentage change = (New value − Old value) ÷ |Old value| × 100

• New value = the final number (this year, the current price, the new salary)
• Old value = the starting number (last year, the purchase price, the old salary)
• |Old value| = the absolute value, so the sign is correct even when the old value is negative

That is the whole percentage increase formula. It is the same one used by teachers, analysts and every online percentage change calculator, and this tool shows the working line by line so you can use it as a percentage increase calculator with solution for homework.

Worked examples

Percentage increase between two numbers

From 80 to 92: change = 12, 12 ÷ 80 = 0.15, × 100 = 15% increase.

Percentage decrease between two numbers

From 250 to 190: change = −60, −60 ÷ 250 = −0.24, × 100 = 24% decrease.

How to calculate percentage increase in salary

Your salary rises from ₹50,000 to ₹56,500 a month – the default values in the calculator. (56,500 − 50,000) ÷ 50,000 × 100 = 13% hike. This is how the salary percentage increase calculator India users need works: compare fixed pay with fixed pay, or CTC with CTC, never CTC with in-hand salary. To see what the new salary means in take-home terms, try the salary calculator.

Percentage increase in rent

Rent going from ₹18,000 to ₹19,800 is a 10% increase. Many rental agreements in Indian cities fix a 5–10% annual rent escalation, so the rent increase percentage calculator use-case is simply: enter the current rent and the proposed rent and check the percent against your agreement.

Percentage increase calculator with years (yearly growth)

When the change happens over several years, the total percentage change can hide the yearly pace. Enter the number of years and the calculator adds two figures:

• Average growth per year (compound) = (New ÷ Old)^1/years − 1. This is the CAGR – the steady yearly rate that turns the old value into the new one.
• Simple average per year = total percentage change ÷ years. Easy to explain, but it overstates growth because it ignores compounding.

Example: an investment grows from ₹1,00,000 to ₹1,61,051 over 5 years. The total increase is 61.05%, the simple average is 12.2% a year, but the compound yearly rate is exactly 10%. For investments use the compound figure or the CAGR calculator; for returns including costs see the ROI calculator. For monthly growth, enter the time as a fraction of a year – 1 month is 0.0833 years – or simply work out month-on-month change for each pair of months.

Percentage increase vs percentage difference

These two are often confused:

Use percentage change when there is a clear before and after (prices, salary, population, marks). Use percentage difference when comparing two things side by side, like the price of the same phone in two shops.

Why a rise and a fall of the same percent do not cancel

A stock that falls 50% needs to rise 100% to get back to where it started, because the rise is measured on a smaller base. The calculator shows this as the "reverse change": going from 56,500 back to 50,000 is an 11.5% decrease, not 13%. This is why a percent gain/loss calculator is useful for traders – a 20% loss needs a 25% gain to recover.

Percentage increase starting from zero

If the old value is 0, the percentage increase cannot be calculated: dividing by zero is undefined, and any rise from nothing would be an "infinite" increase. In that case report the absolute change instead (for example, "sales rose from 0 to 40 units"). The same caution applies to very small starting values – going from 1 to 5 customers is a 400% increase that sounds dramatic but means little.

Negative numbers

When the old value is negative – a business loss, for example – the calculator divides by the absolute value so the sign reads naturally. A loss of −₹20,000 improving to a loss of −₹5,000 is shown as a 75% increase, because the result moved up by 75% of the starting size.

Percentage change with multiple values

For a series of values (month by month, or year over year), calculate the change for each consecutive pair: Jan→Feb, Feb→Mar and so on. To get the average percentage increase across the whole series, use the compound formula with the first and last values and the number of periods, rather than averaging the individual percentages. Averaging percentages gives a wrong answer whenever the changes are uneven.

How to calculate percentage change in Excel

With the old value in A2 and the new value in B2, type =(B2-A2)/ABS(A2) and format the cell as a percentage. For yearly compound growth over the number of years in C2, use =(B2/A2)^(1/C2)-1. For quick mental checks, remember: new ÷ old of 1.13 means +13%, and 0.85 means −15%.

Where percentage change is used

• Money and prices: fuel price hikes, inflation, GST changes – see the inflation calculator for purchasing power.
• Stocks and crypto: daily, monthly and year-over-year (YoY) gains and losses.
• Business: revenue growth, cost cuts, conversion rates and year-on-year sales.
• Health and fitness: weight change in kg over time, such as 80 kg to 74 kg = 7.5% decrease.
• Exams: improvement in marks from a mock test to the final exam.

Percent increase calculator formula

Every percentage increase calculator uses one formula: percentage increase = (new value − old value) ÷ old value × 100. A negative answer is a decrease. How much of a percentage increase is 80 to 100? (100 − 80) ÷ 80 × 100 = 25%.

Percentage increase calculator between 2 numbers

Put the starting number first. From 250 to 300 is a 20% increase, but from 300 to 250 is a 16.67% decrease, because the base changes.

Percentage increase calculator between two percentages

When both values are already percentages, you can report two different things. An interest rate rising from 8% to 10% is a rise of 2 percentage points, but a percentage increase of (10 − 8) ÷ 8 × 100 = 25%. Say which one you mean.

Percentage increase calculator for money: raise, hourly pay and investment

• Raise: a pay raise from ₹42,000 to ₹46,200 a month is (4,200 ÷ 42,000) × 100 = a 10% raise.
• Hourly: an hourly rate going from $20 to $23 is a 15% increase. The percentage is the same whether you compare hourly, monthly or yearly pay, as long as hours do not change.
• Investment: an investment growing from ₹1,00,000 to ₹1,35,000 has increased 35% in total. To compare investments held for different lengths of time, use the yearly rate (CAGR) below.

Percentage increase calculator over time: per year and monthly

A percentage increase calculator with time spreads the total change over the years. The yearly rate is (new ÷ old)^{1 ÷ years} − 1. From 100 to 150 over 5 years: 1.5^0.2 − 1 ≈ 8.45% per year, not 10%, because each year builds on the last. See the CAGR calculator for more.

For a monthly figure, use months instead of years: 100 to 112 over 12 months is (1.12)^1/12 − 1 ≈ 0.95% per month. A percentage increase calculator for time values works the same way: a run time falling from 50 to 45 minutes is a 10% decrease.

Percentage change calculator with multiple values

With a series of values, work out each step from the value just before it. Sales of 200, 230 and 276 give +15% and then +20%. The overall change is 276 ÷ 200 − 1 = 38%, which is not 15% + 20% = 35%, because percentages compound.

Percentage increase: calculate starting from zero

You cannot calculate a percentage increase starting from zero, because dividing by zero is undefined. Going from 0 to 50 users is best described as "an increase of 50", not as a percentage.

Percentage increase without calculator

For a percentage increase without a calculator, find 1% or 10% first. To increase 360 by 15%: 10% is 36, 5% is 18, so 15% is 54 and the answer is 414. To find the percentage increase from 40 to 46, the change is 6, and 6 is 15% of 40 because 4 is 10% and 2 is 5%.

Percentage increase non calculator questions and answers

1. A price rises from £60 to £75. What is the percentage increase? 15 ÷ 60 = 0.25, so 25%.
2. Increase 80 by 35%. 10% = 8, so 30% = 24 and 5% = 4. Answer: 108.
3. A town grows from 12,000 to 13,800 people. 1,800 ÷ 12,000 = 15%.

Students in the UK, Australia and NZ meet these percentage increase calculator questions in GCSE and NCEA-style maths papers, often in a non-calculator section.

Growth percentage calculator for kids

Parents can use this as a growth percentage calculator for kids: a child growing from 120 cm to 126 cm in a year has grown 5%. This is not the same as a height percentile, which compares a child with others of the same age.

Frequently asked questions

Last updated 2026-09-18