Private · No account required
Group Expense Splitter Calculator
Split expenses for trips, roommates, and friends. Add who paid, choose each person's share, and see who owes whom.
Your ledger stays in this browser
Everyone is settled up
Add an expense to calculate balances.
Alice
$0.00
settled
Bob
$0.00
settled
No expenses yet.
How to split group expenses
Add the people in your group, enter each shared expense, choose who paid, and select who should share that cost. The calculator handles many payments across a trip, household, event, or shared project. Split each expense equally, by percentage, by relative shares, or by exact amounts.
Choose the right split method
Equal
Use when every selected participant should cover the same share. Any indivisible smallest currency unit is allocated deterministically so the total stays exact.
Percentage
Use for an agreed ratio such as 50%, 30%, and 20%. The selected percentages must add up to exactly 100%.
Shares
Use relative weights such as 2, 1, and 1 when one person should cover twice as much as each of the others.
Exact amounts
Use when receipts or prior agreements already specify each person's amount. The entries must add up to the expense total.
Worked example: three friends, two expenses
Alice pays $120 for lodging and Bob pays $45 for dinner. If both expenses are split equally among Alice, Bob, and Charlie, the group spent $165 and each person's share is $55. Alice paid $65 more than her share, Bob paid $10 less, and Charlie paid $55 less. A simplified settlement is Bob paying Alice $10 and Charlie paying Alice $55. The ledger reaches the same result even when the expenses are entered in a different order.
A reliable workflow for a real group
1. Agree on the ledger rules
Choose one currency, use recognizable names, and agree whether tips, fees, deposits, refunds, and shared purchases belong in the ledger.
2. Record the payer and participants
The payer is who advanced the money. Participants are the people who should share that specific cost; the payer does not have to be included.
3. Review before anyone pays
Compare the expense list with receipts, correct the payer or split method, and check that all net balances together equal zero.
4. Record payments and keep a backup
After money is sent, record a full or partial payment so the remaining balances stay correct. Copy the result, export a CSV, or save a JSON backup.
How settlements are simplified
The calculator first nets what each person paid against what they should have paid. For up to 10 people with non-zero balances, it searches for a plan with the minimum number of transfers. For larger unsettled groups, it uses deterministic largest-debtor/largest-creditor matching to keep the calculation fast; that plan is simplified but is not claimed to be the mathematical minimum.
What the group expense results mean
Total expenses
The sum of all recorded expenses in the ledger currency. It is not the amount still owed.
Net balance
What a person paid minus their allocated share. Positive means they should receive money; negative means they owe.
Settlement plan
Transfers that bring every net balance to zero. The plan can differ from who originally paid for each item because all expenses are netted together.
Rounding, repayments, refunds, and corrections
Every allocation stays in whole smallest currency units: cents for the supported two-decimal currencies and whole yen for JPY. When an equal or weighted split is not perfectly divisible, the remaining unit is assigned deterministically so the shares still add up to the expense. Record a full or partial repayment only after money has actually been sent. Enter a refund by editing or replacing the affected expense; negative expenses are not supported. Changing a payer, participant, amount, or split can change several proposed transfers.
Private by design, with browser-only storage
Names and expenses are stored in this browser's local storage so the ledger can survive a reload. They are not uploaded to an ONLINTools account because this feature has no account, cloud synchronization, shared link, or payment collection. Clearing browser data or selecting Start over removes the saved ledger. Export a JSON backup to restore the full editable ledger later, or export a CSV for a readable record.
When to use each tool
For a single restaurant check, use the Tip Calculator. For multiple expenses and different payers, keep using this Group Expense Splitter.