ProjectionLab

A Whole-Life Financial Simulator with Deep Tax and Estate Planning

ProjectionLab is a standalone financial planning tool designed to model your entire financial life across multiple possible futures. The platform builds a simulated financial plan based on your inputs (income, expenses, savings, investments, major purchases, milestones) and runs Monte Carlo simulations to show you the spectrum of possible outcomes. Unlike a simple calculator that gives one number, ProjectionLab shows hundreds of possible financial futures, letting you understand your chance of success, see the impact of different decisions, and backtest your plan against historical market data. The tool is designed by Kyle Nolan, an indie developer, and runs entirely in your browser without connecting to your actual bank accounts or financial institutions.

The interface guides you through defining the milestones that matter to you: retirement at a certain age, financial independence, buying a home, taking time off, or other goals. As you build your plan, the tool visualizes your whole life's finances across dozens of possible scenarios, showing you the cash flow year by year, the taxes you would owe in each scenario, the impact of different withdrawal strategies, and the net wealth you would leave behind. The site describes it as "capturing the important details in life that other retirement calculators miss," designed to be intuitive enough for beginners but rich enough for people who want to dig into the numbers in depth. The approach is intentionally flexible: you define your milestones and spending, and the simulator tells you which claiming and withdrawal strategies would work best given your specific situation.

How to Build a Plan and Simulate Outcomes

Getting started with ProjectionLab begins by entering your basic information: current age, income, savings, monthly contribution, and retirement age. Unlike budgeting apps that sync to your bank accounts, ProjectionLab asks you to input your own numbers. You can then layer on complexity: define different spending in different years, plan for major purchases like homes, model going part-time or taking time off, and set up accounts by type (retirement, taxable, and other account types). The tool lets you plan for a partner or spouse, importing their information separately and calculating their own Social Security benefit separately. As you enter your assumptions, the simulator runs multiple scenarios in the background. The core simulation uses Monte Carlo methods to test thousands of possible market sequences and tells you the percentage chance your plan succeeds (that is, you do not run out of money before your target age). The tool displays detailed cash-flow projections using Sankey diagrams that show how money flows between accounts, spending, and investments year by year.

ProjectionLab's strength is its depth in three specific areas where most calculators fall short. The tax analytics section shows your estimated federal taxes, the tax brackets you would fall into in each year, and how sensitive your plan is to changes like moving to a lower-tax state or timing Roth conversions differently. The optimization engine lets you test hundreds of strategies in seconds: you can optimize your Roth conversions, your capital-gains harvesting, your withdrawal order from different accounts, and your target tax brackets to find the combination that reduces your lifetime tax bill or improves your net legacy. The estate planning module models what you leave behind, estimates estate taxes, and lets you account for bequests or inheritances. All of this happens without connecting your accounts; the tool does not ask for access to your bank or brokerage logins.

What ProjectionLab Includes and What It Costs

The site describes two tiers of access: a free retirement planning tool that runs basic projections, and a Premium tier that adds advanced features. The homepage lists Premium features as tax estimation, cash-flow projections, tax optimization, withdrawal strategies, flexible spending, tax analytics, estate planning, and more. However, the captured page does not include the pricing table, so the site does not state what the Premium subscription costs, what the free tier allows you to model, or what features are reserved for paid users. You can get started for free, and the site invites you to "try for free" and "upgrade to Premium." The captured page does not specify whether there is a trial period, a monthly cost, or an annual price. The site does emphasize that "you are not the product": unlike other financial planning tools, ProjectionLab does not sell your data or push you toward the company's own investment products. It also states repeatedly that accounts do not need to be linked, positioning that as a privacy feature.

Beyond the free and premium tiers, ProjectionLab offers a separate Pro version for financial advisors and a Financial Wellness benefit that employers can offer to their staff. The site points to a dedicated Advisors page for pricing and features of the Pro tier, but that page is not included in the capture. The homepage does not state whether the free tier has limits on the number of scenarios you can model, the number of plans you can create, or the number of years you can project forward. These are useful details when comparing it to other tools. The site does state that you can track your progress over time by journaling actual expenses and comparing them against your initial projections, and it supports international scenarios with tax presets for Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, Germany, the Netherlands, and more.

Who This Tool Suits and Who Might Need Something Else

ProjectionLab is well-suited for people who want to understand the math behind complex financial decisions: whether to retire early, how to minimize taxes, whether to buy or rent, how much to spend on a major purchase, or how different life changes would affect your long-term wealth. The testimonials on the site highlight people planning early retirement, couples planning together, people pursuing financial independence, and people who want to test multiple scenarios before making a major decision. The interface draws praise for being intuitive yet detailed, so it works for both beginners and people who love digging into numbers. However, there are limits to what the tool does. It does not connect to your actual accounts, so you must manually enter and update your numbers; it does not offer personalized advice or tell you what to do; it does not manage your investments or execute trades. If you are looking for a tool that automatically syncs your net worth and shows you recommendations based on your situation, ProjectionLab is not that tool. If you want deep scenario modeling and the ability to test hundreds of what-if plans without connecting your accounts, it is a strong fit.