30-year mortgage amortization schedule
A 30-year fixed mortgage is 360 identical payments hiding a very lopsided story: in the early years most of each payment is interest, and the split only crosses over well past the halfway mark. The generator below builds the full payment-by-payment table for your exact loan — principal, interest and remaining balance for all 360 rows — and exports it to Excel, CSV or PDF without your numbers ever leaving your browser.
The preset shows an example $400,000 loan at a 6.5% example rate: the payment is $2,528.27 a month, and by the scheduled payoff you’d have paid $510,180 in interest — more than the amount borrowed. Replace the example with your own balance and quoted rate; the table, chart and exports update instantly.
Preset: example $400,000 30-year loan — replace with your amount and quoted rate
Payment-by-payment schedule
| # | Date | Payment | Principal | Interest | Extra | Balance |
|---|
Click a year to expand its payments. Exports and print always include every payment.
How it works
- Open this page — the calculator is already set up for "30-year mortgage amortization schedule". Swap in your own amount, rate and term.
- Read off the payment, the payoff date and total interest. The full payment-by-payment table is right below.
- Add extra payments or switch to biweekly to watch the payoff date move and the interest saved appear.
- Download the schedule as Excel, CSV or PDF — generated on your device; your loan details never leave your browser.
Why so much of the early payment is interest
Each month’s interest charge is the annual rate divided by twelve, applied to whatever you still owe. On a young loan the balance is at its peak, so the interest slice is at its peak too — on the example above, the first payment sends only about 14% of the money to principal. There’s no trick being played; it’s just what a level payment against a large balance looks like. The useful consequence: anything that shrinks the balance early (extra principal, a lump sum) is disproportionately powerful, because it shrinks every future interest charge downstream of it.
That’s also why the schedule matters more than the rate quote when you’re comparing payoff strategies. Open “Extra payments” in the calculator and the chart shows two balance curves — your scheduled path and the accelerated one — with the interest saved computed exactly, not estimated.
Good to know
- The payment shown is principal + interest only. Your actual monthly bill likely adds property taxes, homeowners insurance and possibly PMI held in escrow — those don’t amortize and aren’t in this table.
- Mortgage lenders quote a note rate and an APR; the schedule runs on the note rate. APR bundles fees and is for comparing offers, not for computing payments.
- US mortgages closed since January 2014 almost never carry prepayment penalties (CFPB rules) — paying extra is nearly always allowed. Older or unusual loans: check your note.
Frequently asked questions
When does more of my payment go to principal than interest?
It depends only on the rate and term, not the loan size. At the example 6.5% over 30 years, the crossover lands around the two-thirds mark of the term — generate your schedule above and scan the Principal column to see the exact month for your numbers. Lower rates cross over years earlier; higher rates, later.
Does this match the schedule my lender would give me?
To within a few dollars, yes — it uses the standard fixed-rate formula (monthly rate on the remaining balance, level payment, adjusted final payment). Small differences come from your lender’s rounding and day-count choices and from any escrow items bundled into the bill. The methodology page spells out every convention used.
Why is total interest more than the house loan itself?
Thirty years is a long time to rent money. At the example rate, interest over the full term exceeds the principal — that’s normal for 30-year loans at mid-single-digit rates, and it’s the honest argument for extra payments or a shorter term if the cash flow allows. The 15-year page shows the same loan on the faster schedule for comparison.