Enter the bill, pick a tip percent, and split it — see the tip amount, the total, and what everyone owes in one tap.
Tipping in America runs on unwritten rules that everyone is somehow expected to know. For full table service at a restaurant: 15% means the service was adequate, 18–20% is the standard for good service, and 25% or more says it was exceptional. These percentages apply to the pre-tax subtotal — the food and drinks, not the government's cut.
Outside restaurants, the map gets patchier. Bars: $1–2 per drink, or 18–20% of the tab. Food delivery: 15–20% with a few-dollar minimum, because the driver is spending their own gas and car. Haircuts and personal services: 15–20%. Coffee shops and counter service: genuinely optional — a dollar in the jar is kind, not required, no matter what the tablet screen implies with its 25% default.
The large-party exception matters: most restaurants add an automatic gratuity of 18–20% for groups of 6–8 or more. That charge IS the tip. Read the bill before you tip on top of it — accidental double-tipping is one of the most common restaurant math errors, and it is completely avoidable once you know to look.
Should the tip be calculated on the bill before or after sales tax? The traditional and technically correct answer: before tax. The tip rewards the service — the food, the attentiveness, the refills — and sales tax is money that passes straight through the restaurant to the government. Tipping on tax means tipping the state, which was never the idea.
In practice, the difference is small. On a $100 bill with 8% tax, 20% pre-tax is $20.00 and 20% post-tax is $21.60 — a $1.60 difference that no server will notice or resent either way. Plenty of generous tippers use the total for simplicity, and that is perfectly fine.
What actually matters more than pre- vs. post-tax: consistency and fairness to the server. Tip percentages have crept upward over the decades (15% was standard in the 1990s; 20% is the baseline now), and service workers' wages have not kept pace with living costs in most states. If you are debating between 18% and 20%, the two dollars will not change your life and might improve someone's night.
Group dinners have exactly one fair rule: everyone pays for what they ordered, plus their share of tax and tip. The even split — total divided by headcount — works only when orders were roughly equal. The moment someone orders a $60 steak while everyone else had $18 pastas, the even split becomes a subsidy, and resentment is the dessert.
The practical method: each person covers their own items, then tax and tip are split proportionally or evenly (evenly is fine — the differences are small). Our calculator handles the clean case: enter the whole bill, the tip percent, and the headcount for an instant per-person figure. For the messy case, have each person compute their subtotal, apply the same tip percent, and add it up.
One more scenario: the person who 'forgot their wallet' or disappears before the bill. Decide the norm before it happens, not after. Groups that rotate who treats, or that default to separate checks for large parties, avoid 90% of bill drama. And if you are the organizer, say 'separate checks, please' when you sit down — your server prefers it too.
Here is something most diners do not know: in many states, tipped workers can legally be paid a lower cash wage (as low as $2.13/hour federally) as long as tips bring them to the full minimum wage — the 'tip credit' system. Your tip is not a bonus on top of a normal wage; in these states, it is the wage. That 20% is doing structural work in someone's livelihood.
Tip pooling complicates the picture further. Many restaurants pool tips and redistribute them among servers, bussers, bartenders, and sometimes kitchen staff. Your generous tip to a great server may be shared by formula — which is either beautiful teamwork or diluted reward, depending on your view. Neither is your problem to solve at the table, but it is worth knowing the money does not always land where you aimed it.
The takeaway is not guilt — it is informed generosity. Tip percentages are social norms with real economic weight behind them. When you tip 20% on good service, you are participating in the system as designed. When service is genuinely bad, the constructive move is a smaller tip plus a word to the manager about what went wrong; stiffing in silence teaches nobody anything.
Convert the tip percent to a decimal, multiply by the bill for the tip amount, add it to the bill for the total, and divide by the party size to split it.
A $85 dinner bill with 20% tip: $85 × 0.20 = $17 tip, $102 total. Split among 4 people, that is $25.50 each — $21.25 for food plus $4.25 tip per person.
A $46 lunch with 18% tip: $46 × 0.18 = $8.28 tip, $54.28 total. Most people round to $8.50 or $9 for simplicity — servers will not mind the extra cents, and clean numbers make splitting easier.
A $200 group dinner with 20% tip split 6 ways: $40 tip, $240 total, $40 per person. Nice round numbers are a coincidence here, but they show why groups love even splits — until someone orders the lobster, at least.
18–20% of the pre-tax bill is the standard for full table service in the US: 15% for adequate service, 20% for good service, 25%+ for exceptional. Below 15% signals something was wrong — and if it was the kitchen's fault, not the server's, say so rather than punishing the tip.
$100 with 20% is $20, for a $120 total. The 20% shortcut: move the decimal one place left ($10 = 10%) and double it ($20 = 20%). For 15%, take 10% and add half again ($10 + $5 = $15).
Standard practice is tipping on the pre-tax subtotal. Tax is a pass-through to the government, not part of the service. Some people tip on the total for simplicity — the difference is small, and generosity never hurts.
Divide the total (bill + tip) by the number of people. On a $120 total split 4 ways, everyone pays $30. For uneven orders, have each person cover their items plus their share of tax and tip — apps can do the math, or just be the hero who does it.
Many restaurants add an automatic 18–20% gratuity for parties of 6–8 or more — check the bill before adding more. That charge is the tip; adding another 20% on top double-tips (though nobody will stop you from being generous).
Generally no for counter service where you order standing up, though tip jars and tablet prompts have made it murky — 10% or a dollar or two is a kind gesture, not an obligation. For delivery, 15–20% (minimum a few dollars) is the norm since drivers supply the car and gas.