Cost of Living Comparison (city to city, equivalent salary)
Pick a source and target city from presets, or enter your own COL and rent indexes from Numbeo, EIU, or Mercer. Set your current salary and approximate rent share. The calculator returns the equivalent salary and the % gap, weighting overall costs and rent separately because rent typically swings more than other categories.
Indexes are approximate and shift with currency moves and local inflation. Treat ±10% as the natural margin of error.
How it works
What the indexes mean
Cost of Living indexes (Numbeo, EIU, Mercer) bundle housing, food, transport, healthcare, and entertainment into a single number anchored to a reference city (often NYC = 100). The Rent Index is just the housing portion, which often varies far more than other categories. This calculator combines them weighted by your rent share so the answer reflects your actual budget, not an average household.
Why split out rent
Rent is typically the most volatile component. NYC vs Berlin: overall COL differs ~50%, but rent differs ~150%. If you spend 40% of your salary on rent, the rent index dominates your reality. If you live in a paid-off home, rent index barely matters.
What's not modeled
Tax differences (huge between US states, EU vs JP). Healthcare access (a single ER visit in the US can dwarf any COL gap). School fees if you have kids. Transportation: car-dependent cities cost more even if rent is cheap. Use the calculator as a starting point, not the final answer.
Frequently asked questions
›Where do these indexes come from?
The presets are approximations of Numbeo's indexes (NYC = 100). For a real relocation decision, pull current numbers directly from Numbeo or EIU — indexes shift each year with currency and inflation.
›Why is the answer so different from a simple multiplier?
Because rent and non-rent costs scale differently. A simple 'NYC is 1.5× Berlin' multiplier hides that NYC rent is 2.5× Berlin while groceries are only 1.2× — so a Berlin-to-NYC mover with low rent share ends up needing far less than 1.5× their salary.
›Should I include taxes?
Use after-tax salary for both sides for the cleanest comparison. The COL indexes are post-tax consumption costs by design. If you compare gross salaries, tax differences (e.g., NY 10%+ vs FL 0%) get dropped.
›What about purchasing power parity (PPP)?
PPP rates from the IMF or World Bank serve a similar role at the country level (USD vs JPY for the same basket). City-level COL indexes are more granular and useful for relocation decisions.
›How accurate are the presets?
Within ±10% of the real Numbeo numbers as of mid-2026. They drift each quarter — for a final decision, look up current values for your specific source/target cities.
›Why is rent share separate from overall COL?
Different people spend wildly different shares on rent. A homeowner with no mortgage spends 0% on rent; a young renter in NYC may spend 50%. Letting you set this turns a generic city comparison into a personal one.
›Should I aim for the equivalent salary, or higher?
Equivalent maintains your lifestyle. For relocation costs (moving, security deposits, replacing furniture), expect 5-10% above equivalent salary in year 1. After that, equivalent is enough.
›Does this work for sub-city comparisons (e.g., Manhattan vs Queens)?
Numbeo provides neighborhood-level rent indexes for many cities. Use those for the rent index input while keeping overall COL identical. The calculator math works at any granularity — it just compares two index pairs.
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