How Much Allowance Should a Child Get? A Simple Way to Decide by Age
Every parent who starts an allowance hits the same question in the first five minutes: how much? Ask ten families and you'll hear ten different numbers, and most of them were picked because they sounded about right.
There is no single correct figure. The right amount depends on what the money is supposed to pay for, how old your child is, and what your household can comfortably keep up every month. There is, though, a right order to decide it in. It starts with the list, not the number.
Decide what the allowance pays for first
A number means nothing until you know what it has to cover. Sit down once and split your child's spending into two groups.
Paid from the allowance
- Snacks and small treats
- Toys and things they want
- Gifts for friends' birthdays
- Saving toward a bigger goal
Still paid by you
- School supplies and fees
- Clothes and shoes
- Meals and everyday food
- Medicine and anything for safety
The first group is what the allowance is for: the choices your child gets to make, and sometimes get wrong. The second group stays yours. If school supplies come out of pocket money, a forgotten notebook turns into a negotiation, and that isn't the lesson you're after.
Three ways to arrive at a number
- 1
The age rule
Give a small fixed amount per year of age, every week. If your unit is 1, a 7 year old gets 7 a week and a 10 year old gets 10. It's easy to explain, siblings can see it's fair, and it rises on its own every birthday.
- 2
The spending-list rule
Add up what the allowance now has to cover in a normal month, using the first group above. That total is the monthly allowance. It takes longer, but the number is tied to real costs instead of a guess.
- 3
The household check
Whatever number you reach, ask one question: can we pay this every single month without thinking twice? An allowance that gets skipped when money is tight teaches more about unreliability than about saving. Pick the amount you can keep.
Most families use the first rule to get a starting point and the second to check it.
A worked example for a 10 year old
Here's how it plays out for a ten-year-old, with numbers in whatever your local currency is. Using the age rule with a unit of 1, the allowance is 10 a week, which is about 40 a month.
Now check it against the spending list. In a normal month, this child buys:
- Snacks at school: 16 a month
- Small toys or hobby bits: 8 a month
- One gift for a friend's birthday: 8 a month
- Saving toward a bigger goal: 8 a month
That also comes to 40. When the two methods land close together, you've found your number. When they don't, the spending list wins, because it reflects what your child actually has to pay for.
The saving line matters more than it looks. At 8 a month, a goal that costs 50 takes about six months. That's long enough to feel real, and short enough that a ten-year-old won't give up halfway.
When and how to raise it
Raise the allowance on a schedule, not on request. Two moments work well:
- Their birthday, if you use the age rule. The raise happens automatically, and there's nothing to argue about for the rest of the year.
- When a new cost moves onto their list. If your 12 year old now pays for their own phone credit, the allowance rises by that amount, and the responsibility comes with it.
Try not to raise it because a friend gets more. Every family's list is different, and comparing numbers without comparing lists is how an allowance creeps upward without teaching anything.
Should the allowance depend on chores?
That's a bigger argument, and it gets its own post. The short answer: keep everyday responsibilities and extra effort separate. The base allowance covers the child's own responsibilities, and extra jobs earn more on top. We lay out that structure, with a worked month of points, in the base-plus-bonus allowance system. If you're still deciding between cash and points at all, start with allowance versus reward points.
Running it in TaskiKids
TaskiKids doesn't move money, so you stay the bank. What it does is turn the allowance into something your child earns and claims. Add "Monthly allowance" to the reward catalog at a points price, set point values on the tasks that earn it, and your child can watch the total build through the month. It's free, with no ads and no in-app purchases.
Frequently asked questions
What age should a child start getting an allowance?
Around 6 or 7, when most children can count money and understand that spending it means it's gone. Younger children usually do better with points and small rewards first, because a week is easier to picture than a month.
Should the allowance be weekly or monthly?
Weekly for children under about 10, monthly from 10 or 11 up. A shorter cycle is easier for a younger child to plan around. A monthly allowance asks them to make it last, which is exactly the skill you want an older child to practise.
Should I take money away as a punishment?
Try not to. If the allowance can disappear for bad behaviour, it stops working as a money lesson and becomes a discipline tool, and your child learns to argue about fines instead of planning purchases. Handle behaviour separately.
Should siblings get the same amount?
Not necessarily. With the age rule, an older child gets more because they're older and usually pay for more, and younger siblings can see the rule is the same for everyone. Fair means the same rule, not the same number.
Keep reading
The Base-Plus-Bonus Allowance System for Kids
An allowance system for kids that splits tasks into two buckets: the responsibilities that earn their regular allowance, and the extras that earn more than it.
Allowance vs. Reward Points: What Actually Works
Should you pay kids cash or run a points system? What each one is genuinely good at, the hybrid most families land on, and where a kids allowance app fits.
Age-by-Age Chore Guide: What's Reasonable at 7, 10, and 13
How many chores a 7, 10, or 13 year old can reasonably handle, how much supervision each age still needs, and a three-question test for any new chore.