Funeral costs and help
Funeral cost inflation, year by year since 1987
Type a funeral price and its year to see it at today’s prices, and how far it would move in the years ahead at the recent trend.
Independent site, not an insurer or a broker, and not a funeral home or a government agency.
A funeral price carried to today
Example, not your result yet· change a figure to see yours
Same funeral at today’s prices
$8,219
| Funeral prices since then | 16% |
| All consumer prices, same years | 10% |
| In 10 years at 2.6% a year | $10,617 |
BLS CPI-U, funeral expenses (CUUR0000SEGD02), annual average of the year typed against the latest month. The all-items line stops at the last full year.
Funeral cost inflation is measured by the Bureau of Labor Statistics in the Consumer Price Index for funeral expenses, a monthly series that starts in December 1986 at 100. In September 2026 it stood at 418.2, 2.7% higher than a year earlier, while all consumer prices rose 3.7%. From 2015 to 2025, funeral prices rose 2.6% a year on average, against 3.1% for all items. The index follows the prices of a fixed set of funeral goods and services paid by urban consumers, not what families choose to spend. A price fixed in the past, such as the face amount of an old burial policy or a sum set aside years ago, buys less as the index rises. The calculator converts any amount from one year to today and projects it at the recent trend.
Data read and sums checked by Radif Partners · Editorial policy · How the figures are worked out
The index, every year
Annual averages of the funeral expenses index, its change on the year before, the same change for all consumer prices, and what $1,000 of funeral spending in each year amounts to at September 2026 prices.
| Year | Funeral index | Funeral prices, change | All prices, change | $1,000 then, in September 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1987 | 102.5 | $4,080 | ||
| 1988 | 106.6 | 4.0% | 4.1% | $3,923 |
| 1989 | 111.3 | 4.4% | 4.8% | $3,758 |
| 1990 | 118.3 | 6.3% | 5.4% | $3,535 |
| 1991 | 125.7 | 6.3% | 4.2% | $3,327 |
| 1992 | 131.5 | 4.6% | 3.0% | $3,180 |
| 1993 | 137.7 | 4.7% | 3.0% | $3,037 |
| 1994 | 144.7 | 5.1% | 2.6% | $2,890 |
| 1995 | 153.4 | 6.0% | 2.8% | $2,726 |
| 1996 | 161.2 | 5.1% | 3.0% | $2,594 |
| 1997 | 169.9 | 5.4% | 2.3% | $2,462 |
| 1998 | 176.5 | 3.9% | 1.6% | $2,370 |
| 1999 | 182.7 | 3.5% | 2.2% | $2,289 |
| 2000 | 187.8 | 2.8% | 3.4% | $2,227 |
| 2001 | 194.6 | 3.6% | 2.8% | $2,149 |
| 2002 | 204.1 | 4.9% | 1.6% | $2,049 |
| 2003 | 212.1 | 3.9% | 2.3% | $1,972 |
| 2004 | 221.3 | 4.3% | 2.7% | $1,890 |
| 2005 | 228.8 | 3.4% | 3.4% | $1,828 |
| 2006 | 240.6 | 5.2% | 3.2% | $1,738 |
| 2007 | 252.6 | 5.0% | 2.8% | $1,656 |
| 2008 | 265.4 | 5.1% | 3.8% | $1,576 |
| 2009 | 275.7 | 3.9% | -0.4% | $1,517 |
| 2010 | 282.0 | 2.3% | 1.6% | $1,483 |
| 2011 | 288.3 | 2.2% | 3.2% | $1,451 |
| 2012 | 293.8 | 1.9% | 2.1% | $1,424 |
| 2013 | 301.6 | 2.7% | 1.5% | $1,387 |
| 2014 | 307.1 | 1.8% | 1.6% | $1,362 |
| 2015 | 313.7 | 2.1% | 0.1% | $1,333 |
| 2016 | 319.4 | 1.8% | 1.3% | $1,309 |
| 2017 | 325.6 | 1.9% | 2.1% | $1,285 |
| 2018 | 331.7 | 1.9% | 2.4% | $1,261 |
| 2019 | 337.9 | 1.9% | 1.8% | $1,238 |
| 2020 | 343.3 | 1.6% | 1.2% | $1,218 |
| 2021 | 348.8 | 1.6% | 4.7% | $1,199 |
| 2022 | 360.2 | 3.3% | 8.0% | $1,161 |
| 2023 | 379.3 | 5.3% | 4.1% | $1,103 |
| 2024 | 395.4 | 4.2% | 2.9% | $1,058 |
| 2025 | 405.2 | 2.5% | 2.6% | $1,032 |
What the index measures
The BLS prices a fixed set of funeral goods and services, month after month, in urban areas across the country, and reports how the price of that set changes. It does not measure what families spend: if more of them choose cremation, spending per death falls even when every price on the list rises. That is why this site uses two sources together. The level comes from the Census Bureau, which counts what death-care businesses took in per death in 2022 ($7,078 nationally). The movement since then comes from the BLS index, which brings that level to $8,219 at September 2026 prices.
The series is national. The BLS publishes consumer prices for regions and large metro areas, but the funeral index used here is the U.S. city average, so the same rate applies in every state. A state that spends more per death today will, at the same rate, keep spending more in dollars in the years ahead.
Using the rate for planning
Every plan to pay for a funeral in advance is a bet on this rate. Money in a savings account keeps pace if it earns at least as much after tax. A prepaid funeral contract fixes the price of what it lists, which removes the bet for those items. A burial or final expense policy pays a fixed sum, so its value at the funeral falls by this rate every year it is held. The funeral cost calculator uses the ten-year average, 2.6% a year, to carry your state’s figure to the median age at death, and lets you type another rate in the second panel.
A ten-year average smooths out single years, but it is not a forecast. A higher rate makes a fixed sum lose value faster and a prepaid contract look better; a lower one does the reverse. Trying two or three rates in the calculator shows how much the answer depends on it.
Two checks help when a rate is quoted to you. A seller of a prepaid contract or a burial policy may quote a growth figure for funeral prices; compare it with the ten-year average shown here, read on the BLS series, and ask where theirs comes from. And a figure from an old article, a price list from a past year or a relative’s funeral bill can be brought to today with the calculator above, which uses the annual average of the year typed against the latest month published.