Saving for a child’s education is easier when you can actually see where the numbers land. This RESP Calculator projects what a Registered Education Savings Plan could be worth by the time your child turns 18 — the endpoint used here, since CESG eligibility itself ends in the year the child turns 17. You enter the child’s age, how much you plan to put in each year, and a reasonable growth assumption. The calculator folds in the Canada Education Savings Grant and breaks the result into three parts — your money, the government’s money, and the growth they generate together.

Child’s Current Age

Enter the child’s current age. This calculator projects the RESP until age 18.

Current RESP Balance ($)

What’s already in the plan. Leave at 0 if you’re just starting. If this balance already includes past CESG and growth, the calculator treats it as a single starting amount.

Annual Contribution ($)

How much you plan to contribute each year. The first 2,500 per year attracts the full 20% CESG.

Expected Annual Return (%)

Average yearly growth rate, net of fees. Choose a figure that matches the portfolio you’re using.

Include Canada Education Savings Grant (20% match)

Meets age 16–17 CESG eligibility requirements

Only affects contributions made in the year the child turns 16 or 17. If the child is younger, leave it checked.

Value at Age 18

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Contributions + Starting Balance

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Total CESG Grant

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Investment Growth

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Projected RESP Value at 18

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Set your inputs to calculate

Detail	Value

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Before you lean on these numbers, one thing to keep in mind — the calculator runs a simple year-by-year compounding model on the inputs you give it. It assumes annual contributions and CESG grants are added at the beginning of each projection year. It uses a simplified standard CESG assumption (20% on the first $2,500 contributed each year, subject to the $7,200 lifetime cap) and doesn’t model carry-forward grant room or the additional CESG for lower-income families. It also doesn’t include tax on withdrawals, plan fees, or market volatility. Treat the output as a planning estimate, not a guarantee.

💱 This tool is set up for Canadian RESP accounts and shows results in Canadian dollars. If you’re modelling a similar education savings plan somewhere else, the math still works — but the grant rules won’t apply.

What Is an RESP Calculator?

An RESP Calculator is a projection tool that tells you roughly what a Registered Education Savings Plan could grow into by the time a child reaches post-secondary age. You give it the child’s age, your planned annual contribution, and a growth assumption. It compounds everything forward to age 18.

What separates RESP projections from ordinary investment projections is the grant. Ottawa adds 20% on the first $2,500 of contributions each year through the Canada Education Savings Grant, up to a lifetime maximum per child. That grant money sits inside the plan and compounds right alongside your contributions. Over 18 years, it can add tens of thousands of dollars. This is why any serious RESP contribution calculator treats grants as a separate line item instead of quietly folding them into the return rate.

How to Use This RESP Calculator

The tool asks for four inputs and two checkboxes. Every one of them affects the outcome.

Child’s Current Age. This sets the runway. A newborn gets 18 years of compounding. A ten-year-old gets eight. Starting earlier gives the grant more time to work, but a late start still helps.

Current RESP Balance. If there’s already money in the plan, put the current value here. If you’re opening a new one, leave it at zero. The calculator treats whatever you enter as the opening balance and grows it along with new contributions. Keep in mind that an existing balance may already contain past CESG and prior growth — the calculator doesn’t separate those out.

Annual Contribution. What you plan to add each year. The first $2,500 attracts the full 20% CESG match. Anything above that still grows tax-sheltered, but the standard grant stops at $2,500 of contributions per year. The lifetime contribution room per child is $50,000.

Expected Annual Return. Your best guess at what the portfolio earns each year, after fund fees. An RESP can hold the same things as an RRSP or TFSA — mutual funds, ETFs, GICs, individual stocks, bonds. A balanced portfolio might target somewhere around 4% to 6%. An equity-heavy one might aim higher, with more ups and downs along the way.

Include CESG Grant. On by default. Uncheck it if you want to see the plan without any government money.

Meets age 16–17 CESG eligibility requirements. Contributions made in the calendar year the child turns 16 or 17 only earn CESG if prior contribution conditions were met. If you’re not sure whether you meet them, uncheck this box and the calculator will stop granting CESG in those final two years.

Press calculate and you’ll see four numbers: the total of your starting balance and new contributions, the total CESG received, investment growth, and the combined projected value at 18. The results table also shows what the plan could look like at intermediate milestones — age 5, 10, 15, and 18.

How RESP Growth Is Calculated

The math is compound growth, applied one year at a time. Each year, your contribution and the grant go in, and the whole balance grows at the assumed rate.

Balance_next = (Balance_current + Contribution + Grant) × (1 + rate)

The grant itself is calculated separately:

Grant = 20% × min(Contribution, $2,500)

With a lifetime cap. The standard CESG lifetime maximum is $7,200 per child. Once you hit that, additional contributions stop earning a match.

One timing note worth knowing: the calculator assumes annual contributions and CESG grants are added at the beginning of each projection year, and the full balance compounds for the entire year. In practice, contributions can happen at any time, and money added late in a year compounds for less time.

Because the calculator runs a small year-by-year loop rather than a single formula, the timing of contributions matters. Money that goes in early gets more years to compound than money that goes in late. Grants work the same way. Two families contributing the same total amount can end up with different results depending on when the money arrived.

A simple illustration: $2,500 a year for 18 years at a 5% return. Total contributions come to $45,000. The 20% CESG adds $500 per year until the lifetime cap of $7,200 is reached — which happens in year 15. Compounded at 5%, the plan ends up around $86,600. That’s a gain of roughly $41,600 on top of the money you put in, and about $7,200 of that comes directly from the government grant.

Change any one input and the picture shifts. Bump the return assumption to 6% and the end value climbs by thousands. Drop the contribution to $1,000 a year and the grant falls to $200 annually, which compounds to a much smaller total.

What Is the Canada Education Savings Grant?

The Canada Education Savings Grant is why RESPs stand out from other savings accounts. It’s a federal program that matches a portion of your annual contributions and deposits the money straight into the plan.

The basic grant is 20% of the first $2,500 you contribute each year. That works out to $500 per year, capped. Across 18 years the theoretical maximum would be $9,000, but the actual lifetime cap is $7,200 — most families hit it well before the child turns 18 if they contribute the full amount every year.

There’s also an additional CESG for lower- and middle-income families. Depending on net family income, Ottawa may add an extra 10% or 20% on the first $500 of annual contributions — on top of the basic 20%. Families with very low incomes can also get the Canada Learning Bond, which adds up to $2,000 to a child’s RESP without requiring any personal contributions.

This calculator uses the standard 20% grant only. It doesn’t model carry-forward grant room, or the extra CESG that lower-income families can receive. If any of those apply to you, the projection here will understate the final balance.

RESP Contribution Rules and Limits

A few rules matter when you’re planning this out.

Lifetime contribution limit. $50,000 per beneficiary over the life of the plan. No annual cap. But contributions above $2,500 per year don’t earn extra grant money beyond the standard CESG. Overcontributions above $50,000 trigger a 1% monthly penalty on the excess until you withdraw it.

Age limit on contributions. RESP contributions can generally continue for up to 31 years after the plan is opened, subject to the plan and beneficiary rules. CESG grants, however, only accumulate until the end of the year the child turns 17 — after that, no new grants are possible.

Grant eligibility. To receive CESG, the beneficiary must be a Canadian resident with a valid Social Insurance Number. Contributions made in the year the child turns 16 or 17 only earn grants if certain conditions are met — typically that at least $2,000 was contributed (and not withdrawn) before the end of the year the child turned 15, or that at least $100 was contributed in each of any four years before age 16.

Carry-forward room. If you missed contributing the full $2,500 in a prior year, the unused grant room carries forward. You can catch up in later years by contributing more, up to a maximum grant of $1,000 per year (which covers one current year’s grant plus one year of catch-up). A family that starts an RESP when the child is 10 instead of at birth can still recover a chunk of the missed grant room by contributing higher amounts in later years — subject to the annual grant cap. This calculator doesn’t model carry-forward; it assumes the standard $500-per-year grant until the lifetime cap is reached.

Family vs individual plans. Family RESPs let you pool contributions for multiple children under one plan, which gives more flexibility if one child doesn’t pursue post-secondary education. Individual plans are set up for one beneficiary. Both follow the same contribution and grant rules for each child.

RESP vs Other Education Savings Options

An RESP isn’t the only way to save for a child’s education. Each alternative has trade-offs.

Tax-Free Savings Account (TFSA). Growth is tax-free, withdrawals are tax-free, and there are no restrictions on what the money can be used for. But TFSAs share their contribution room across all your savings goals, and there’s no government grant. If your TFSA is already maxed out, using it for education means less room for retirement.

Registered Retirement Savings Plan (RRSP). Contributions are tax-deductible, which is genuinely useful for high earners. But withdrawals are taxed as income, and the account is designed for retirement. Using an RRSP for a child’s education triggers tax at your marginal rate, which can be painful if you’re still working.

In-Trust accounts. Money held for a minor in a taxable account. Growth is taxed at the child’s rate or the parent’s rate, depending on where the money came from, and there’s no grant. Simpler than an RESP but usually less tax-efficient.

Informal family savings. A regular savings account or GIC held by a parent and earmarked for education. Easy to set up, but fully taxable and no grant. Often works as a supplement to an RESP rather than a replacement.

Worked Examples You Can Relate To

Three scenarios to show how the numbers play out. All use the same simplified CESG assumption the calculator uses: 20% on the first $2,500 each year, up to $7,200 lifetime, with contributions and grants added at the start of each year.

Example 1: Starting at Birth, Contributing $2,500 per Year

An RESP opened for a newborn, with $2,500 contributed every year for 18 years at a 5% return.

Total personal contributions: $45,000
Total CESG received: $7,200 (lifetime cap reached in year 15)
Investment growth: approximately $34,400
Projected value at age 18: approximately $86,600

The plan ends up close to double what you put in. The $7,200 in CESG alone, compounded at 5% over the years, contributes a meaningful share of that growth.

Example 2: Starting at Age 6

An RESP opened for a six-year-old, with $2,500 contributed every year for 12 years at a 5% return.

Total personal contributions: $30,000
Total CESG received: $6,000
Investment growth: approximately $14,100
Projected value at age 18: approximately $50,100

Starting later still produces a solid result, but the shorter runway means less compounding. The grant is smaller too because there are fewer years of contributions to match.

Example 3: Contributing $5,000 per Year

$5,000 contributed every year for 18 years at a 5% return, with grants only on the first $2,500 each year.

Total personal contributions: $90,000
Total CESG received: $7,200 (lifetime cap reached in year 15)
Investment growth: approximately $63,200
Projected value at age 18: approximately $160,400

The extra contributions grow tax-sheltered but don’t earn additional grant money beyond the annual cap.

How RESP Withdrawals Work

What happens when the money comes out matters just as much as what happens going in. Withdrawals fall into two buckets, and they’re taxed differently.

Educational Assistance Payments (EAPs). This is the grant money and the investment growth. It’s paid out to the student and taxed in the student’s hands. Since most students have little or no income while studying, the tax on EAPs is often minimal or zero. That’s the real tax advantage of the RESP structure — the growth and grants get taxed at the student’s rate, not the parent’s.

Post-Secondary Education (PSE) withdrawals. These are your own contributions coming back out. You already paid tax on that money before contributing, so PSE withdrawals are tax-free. There’s no limit on how much PSE money you can withdraw as long as the student is enrolled in a qualifying program.

To make a withdrawal, the beneficiary needs to be enrolled in a qualifying post-secondary program. The school confirms enrolment and the plan administrator releases the funds. EAP withdrawals are capped during the first 13 weeks of enrolment: $8,000 for students in full-time programs and $4,000 per 13-week period for those in part-time programs. After that initial window, you can withdraw as much as needed for education costs.

If the child doesn’t end up pursuing post-secondary education, the RESP doesn’t have to be a waste. There are several routes: transfer the money to a sibling’s RESP, or — under certain conditions — transfer up to $50,000 of accumulated RESP income into an RRSP or spousal RRSP, subject to the applicable CRA rules and your available contribution room. Alternatively, you can withdraw the contributions and return the grants. Each option has different tax consequences.

Common RESP Mistakes to Avoid

A few missteps come up over and over. Each one costs real money.

Starting too late. Every year you delay reduces both the grant total and the years of compounding. Starting at birth versus starting at age 10 can mean a difference of tens of thousands of dollars by the time the child turns 18.

Contributing too little to maximise the CESG. If you put in less than $2,500 in a year, you leave grant money on the table. Even if the full $50,000 lifetime limit isn’t a concern, hitting the $2,500 threshold every year is worth doing purely for the 20% match.

Ignoring carry-forward room. Missed grant room doesn’t disappear. It carries forward, and you can catch up in later years by contributing up to $5,000 per year, which brings in up to $1,000 in grants annually. The calculator here doesn’t model this, but the CRA’s rules do allow it.

Using the wrong investments. An RESP can hold almost anything, but the time horizon matters. A plan for a newborn can afford more equity exposure. A plan for a 16-year-old shouldn’t be heavily invested in volatile stocks, because there isn’t time to recover from a market drop before the money is needed.

Not naming a family plan. Family RESPs give you flexibility to shift money between siblings if one doesn’t pursue post-secondary education. Individual plans don’t offer that.

Forgetting to claim the grant. The CESG isn’t automatic in every case. Your RESP provider usually applies for it when you contribute, but you should verify the grants are actually being deposited. Money that doesn’t get claimed quietly is money you never get back.

If this RESP calculator was useful, these related tools might round out your financial planning.

Additional Financial Resources

If you want the official program details — current grant rates, eligibility rules, and how to open an RESP — the Government of Canada’s Education Savings page is the place to start. It’s kept up to date and written in plain language.

For the fine print on contribution limits, withdrawal procedures, and grant eligibility, the Canada Revenue Agency’s RESP information hub is the authoritative source.

Frequently Asked Questions About RESPs

1. What is an RESP Calculator?

It’s a projection tool that estimates how much a Registered Education Savings Plan could be worth by the time the child turns 18. You put in the child’s age, your annual contributions, and a growth assumption, and it shows you the projected balance along with how much came from grants and how much came from investment growth.

2. How much can I contribute to an RESP?

The lifetime limit is $50,000 per beneficiary. There’s no annual cap, but only the first $2,500 each year earns the standard 20% CESG. Contributions above the $50,000 lifetime limit trigger a 1% monthly penalty tax on the excess until you withdraw it.

3. How much is the CESG grant worth?

The basic CESG matches 20% of the first $2,500 contributed each year — up to $500 annually and $7,200 over the child’s lifetime. Lower-income families may qualify for an additional 10% or 20% on the first $500 of annual contributions, plus the Canada Learning Bond, which doesn’t require any personal contributions. This calculator uses only the standard 20% grant.

4. What return should I assume for an RESP?

It depends on the portfolio. A bond-heavy plan might target 3% to 4%. A balanced one, 5% to 6%. An equity-heavy plan could aim for 7% or more, but with more volatility. Whatever rate you pick, it’s an assumption, not a promise. Real returns vary year to year, sometimes sharply.

5. When can I withdraw money from an RESP?

Your own contributions can come out tax-free as Post-Secondary Education payments any time after the beneficiary enrols in a qualifying program. Grant money and growth come out as Educational Assistance Payments and are taxed in the student’s hands. During the first 13 weeks of enrolment, EAP withdrawals are capped at $8,000 for students in full-time programs and $4,000 per 13-week period for part-time programs.

6. What happens if my child doesn’t go to post-secondary school?

You have options. Transfer the RESP to a sibling, or — under certain conditions — transfer up to $50,000 of accumulated RESP income into an RRSP or spousal RRSP, subject to the applicable CRA rules and available contribution room. Alternatively, you can withdraw the contributions and return the grants to the government. Each path has different tax implications, so it’s worth talking to an advisor before deciding.

7. Can I open an RESP for a child who isn’t mine?

Yes. Grandparents, aunts, uncles, and even family friends can open an RESP for any child. The plan belongs to the subscriber, not the beneficiary, so you keep control of the account. Anyone can contribute, though the CESG is tied to the beneficiary and follows the same lifetime caps.

8. Is an RESP worth it if I can only contribute a small amount?

Yes. Even small contributions earn the 20% CESG match, up to $500 a year. If you’re contributing anything at all, the grant makes an RESP more efficient than almost any other savings vehicle. Starting small and increasing later beats waiting until you can afford a bigger amount.

⚠️ Disclaimer: The results from this RESP Calculator are hypothetical projections based on user-supplied assumptions and are for educational and informational purposes only. They should not be treated as financial, investment, or tax advice. The calculator uses a simplified annual compounding model with a standard CESG assumption (20% on the first $2,500 contributed each year, subject to the $7,200 lifetime cap), assumes contributions and grants are added at the start of each projection year, and does not model carry-forward grant room, additional CESG for lower-income families, the Canada Learning Bond, plan fees, taxes on withdrawals, or market volatility. Grant rules and contribution limits are set by the Government of Canada and may change. Please consult a qualified financial advisor or the Canada Revenue Agency for guidance specific to your situation.