A Split Bill Calculator
A split bill divides one restaurant bill between several people, and nearly every disagreement about it comes from the order of operations rather than from the arithmetic. The tip is a percentage of the pre-tip bill, it has to be added before anything is divided, and the split only stops being trivial once the shares stop being equal.
Total per person
70.8
- Total including tip
- 283.2
- Tip on the whole bill
- 43.2
- Share before the tip
- 60
Values update as you type. This calculator covers the single scenario its formula assumes — see Common Mistakes for what it leaves out.
The formula this calculator uses
tip = bill x rate; total = bill + tip; per person = total / people
- bill
- The pre-tip bill — the base the percentage is applied to
- rate
- Tip percentage as a decimal, so 18 per cent becomes 0.18
- tip
- The gratuity for the whole table, 43.199999999999996 on 240 at 18 per cent
- people
- Number of people splitting, 4 in the worked case
- total
- Bill plus tip, 283.2, which is the figure that gets divided
How to check the result by hand
- 1
Establish the pre-tip bill
The tip is a percentage of the bill before gratuity, not of anyone's share. On a 240 bill that base is 240, and it stays 240 until the tip has been added. Confirm the figure excludes any service charge before using it.
- 2
Turn the tip rate into a decimal
Eighteen per cent is 0.18. Multiplying 240 by 0.18 gives 43.199999999999996, which is the tip for the whole table. The division by a hundred is the step most often skipped, and skipping it inflates the tip a hundredfold.
- 3
Add the tip to the bill
240 plus 43.199999999999996 equals 283.2. This is the total that actually gets divided, and it is the number to compare against the card slip. If the slip disagrees, the tip or the rate was mistyped rather than the addition.
- 4
Divide the total by the number of people
283.2 divided by 4 is 70.8 per person. The same bill without a tip would be 240 / 4 = 60.0, so the gratuity adds 10.8 to each share. Dividing after the tip is added keeps the effective rate at 18 per cent for everyone.
- 5
Round once, at the end, and place the remainder
Four shares of 70.8 round to 71 each, giving 284 against the 283.2 owed. The 0.8 difference is the remainder, and it normally goes into the pooled tip. Round the final share, never the per-person figure before the tip is added.
For worked examples, common mistakes and the limits of this formula, read the full How To Calculate A Split Bill page.