Judgment interest calculator

Pick the "Texas — prejudgment" preset for a Texas personal injury, wrongful death, or property damage claim, or select Custom and enter your own state's statutory rate. Prejudgment interest is a separate calculation from postjudgment interest, and it exists to compensate a claimant for the time between when the loss happened and when a court actually entered judgment on it — money that would otherwise have been sitting uncompensated for months or years.

Start date is where most calculation errors happen, because the trigger isn't the same in every state or every claim type. For a Texas tort claim under Civil Practice & Remedies Code Chapter 304, Subchapter B, interest begins accruing on the earlier of two dates: 180 days after the defendant received written notice of the claim, or the date suit was actually filed. Whichever comes first controls — not whichever is more convenient to calculate from.

End date is the day before the judgment is signed — prejudgment interest stops accruing the moment postjudgment interest starts, so the two periods never overlap and never leave a gap. Compounding for the Texas tort preset defaults to simple interest, because that's what the statute specifies for prejudgment interest, even though postjudgment interest on the same claim compounds annually.

The number the calculator returns gets added to the underlying award — the jury verdict or settlement figure — to produce the total judgment amount. That combined figure is what then starts accruing postjudgment interest, separately, from the judgment date forward. See the worked example below for exactly how that handoff plays out with real numbers.

Select "Texas — postjudgment" or "Michigan — general money judgment", or Custom for another state. Start date is the date the judgment was signed by the court — not the date it becomes final after any appeal, and not the date it was docketed. End date is the date of payment or satisfaction; leave it at today's date to see the running total on a judgment that's still unpaid.

Both Texas and Michigan postjudgment interest compound annually, which the calculator handles automatically once you select either preset and a date range spanning more than one year — the year-by-year breakdown table above the results shows exactly how each year's interest gets folded into the next year's opening balance.

The one real limitation: this calculator applies a single flat annual rate across whatever date range you enter. Texas judgments don't need a workaround for that, because the rate locks in permanently at the judgment's entry date. Michigan judgments do — the statutory rate resets every January 1 and July 1, so a judgment running for more than six months has almost certainly crossed at least one reset. Running the date range straight through with only today's rate will produce a number that's close but not exact. The fix is straightforward: run the calculator once per six-month segment at that segment's certified rate, then add the interest totals together. The worked example further down shows precisely how much that split changes the result.

Texas uses the same rate formula for prejudgment interest on tort claims (personal injury, wrongful death, property damage) and postjudgment interest on any money judgment: the Federal Reserve prime rate, with a 5% floor and a 15% ceiling, under Texas Finance Code §304.003. The Office of Consumer Credit Commissioner determines the rate monthly, and whatever rate applies on a judgment's entry date stays fixed for that judgment's life.

The two differ on compounding, though: postjudgment interest compounds annually, while prejudgment interest on tort claims is simple interest only. A contract claim without its own stated interest rate follows a different analysis entirely — Finance Code §304.002 instead, capped at 18% — worth confirming with a Texas attorney rather than assuming the tort rate applies.

As of September 2026, the OCCC-published rate has held at 6.75% every single month since January 2026 — the longest stretch without a monthly change since the extended run at the 5.00% statutory floor that lasted from mid-2020 through most of 2022. That stability makes 6.75% a reasonable default for a rough estimate on a judgment expected soon, but the rate is still set monthly, not annually, so it's worth confirming the OCCC's published figure for the specific month a judgment is actually entered.

A commercial vehicle collision causes $40,000 in property damage. The claimant sends the at-fault driver's insurer written notice of the claim on March 10, 2025 — 180 days later would be September 6, 2025 — but the claimant's attorney files suit sooner, on May 1, 2025. Because Texas prejudgment interest starts on the earlier of those two dates, May 1, 2025 controls, not September 6.

A jury returns a $40,000 verdict, and the judge signs judgment on March 1, 2026. Prejudgment interest runs from May 1, 2025 through February 28, 2026 — the day before judgment — a span of 303 days, at the 6.75% rate in effect, as simple interest (tort prejudgment interest in Texas never compounds).

Interest = $40,000 × 6.75% × (303 ÷ 365) = $40,000 × 0.0675 × 0.8301 ≈ $2,241. That amount gets added to the $40,000 verdict, making the total judgment $42,241 — and it's that $42,241 figure, not the original $40,000 verdict, that starts accruing postjudgment interest (compounding annually) from March 1, 2026 forward until it's paid, using the same mechanics as the postjudgment worked example above.

A $75,000 Michigan judgment is entered on July 1, 2025 and remains unpaid through June 30, 2026 — exactly one year, but a year that crosses the January 1, 2026 rate reset. Running it correctly means calculating two separate periods, each at its own certified rate.