Gift budget calculator
Pick the occasion and how close you are. The suggested range is built from the cited figures on our how much to spend pages — published survey data where it exists, named etiquette guidance where it doesn’t.
The whole table, in one place
This is the calculator’s entire dataset. Rows are occasions, columns are how close you are to the person, and each occasion links to the page that cites its figures.
| Occasion | Coworker or acquaintance | Friend | Close friend | Extended family | Immediate family / best friend |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| wedding gift | $75–$150 | $100–$200 | $150–$250 | $100–$150 | $250 and up |
| coworker gift | $10–$25 | $20–$30 | $25–$50 | — | — |
| Secret Santa and white elephant price limits | $25–$40 | $30–$50 | $30–$50 | $40–$75 | $40–$75 |
| housewarming gift | $15–$30 | $25–$50 | $50–$75 | $50–$100 | $50–$100 |
| birthday gift | $15–$25 | $25–$50 | $50–$75 | $50–$75 | $75–$150 |
| baby shower gift | $25–$50 | $50–$100 | $100–$200 | $50–$100 | $100–$200 |
- coworker gift: Family isn’t a coworker bracket — if you’re shopping for a relative you work with, use the birthday or holiday figures instead.
- Secret Santa and white elephant price limits: A Secret Santa number is set by the group, not by how close you are — this is the band your group probably belongs in.
- birthday gift: Only two of these bands are surveyed — the $55.65 adult going rate and the $25 workplace ceiling. The scaling either side of them is our editorial judgement.
- A dash means the bracket doesn’t apply to that occasion rather than that the figure is zero.
How the number is worked out
Each occasion has an anchor drawn from a named source — Zola and The Knot for weddings, CareerBuilder for coworkers, Elfster for gift exchanges, Empower’s going-rate research for birthdays. The “budget right now” setting then moves you inside that published band: keeping it tight holds you to the bottom of it, standard gives you the band as published, and feeling generous takes the top half.
What the tool deliberately will not do is invent a number. It never returns a figure outside the range its source actually published, and where a source offers no relationship split — a Secret Santa cap is set by the group, not by closeness — it says so instead of manufacturing one.
Spend it, then
The number is the easy half. Our gift guides are sorted by person, occasion and budget band — under $25 for the office draw, under $50 for most birthdays, under $100 where craft starts — and the collections are there if you would rather browse by idea than by recipient.
Sources
- Zola — “How Much to Spend on a Wedding Gift” Cites Zola’s 2026 First Look Report: average gift spend $130, most guests $100–$150. Retrieved 2026-08-27.
- The Knot — “How Much to Spend on a Wedding Gift” Ranges by relationship, plus The Knot Guest Study average of $150. Retrieved 2026-08-27.
- Empower “Going Rate” research, reported by GOBankingRates (17 Dec 2025) Empower online survey of 2,202 US adults 18+, fielded 19–21 Aug 2025. Figures are what respondents named as the going rate.
- CareerBuilder workplace gift survey (Harris Poll) Online survey of 3,336 US employees 18+, fielded 11 Aug–7 Sep 2016. Oldest source on this page and the only real survey of coworker gift spending we could find — treat as a floor, not a 2026 number.
- Elfster — “Secret Santa Rules”, 2026 budget guidance Organiser guidance by group type from the gift-exchange platform. Editorial guidance, not survey data.
- WhiteElephantRules.com — “Price Range” Updated September 2024. Etiquette guidance, not survey data.
- PocketWell — “How Much Money to Give for a Housewarming Gift” Updated July 2026. Etiquette guidance, not survey data — the article states its ranges follow general US gifting norms.
- Greatest Gift — “Baby Shower Gift Spending Guide” Updated 25 December 2023. Etiquette guidance, not survey data.
- Babylist registry data, as cited by WebBabyShower (13 Jan 2026) Secondary citation: we could not retrieve Babylist’s own report, so this figure is reported second-hand and flagged as such.