Find your real final price after two discounts are applied one after another
💡 Why This Matters "20% off, then an extra 20% off" sounds like 40% off — it isn't. Stacked discounts multiply, not add, and the gap between what you'd expect and what you actually pay grows with bigger percentages.
Two 20% discounts stacked together only work out to 36% off, not 40% — the second discount applies to the already-lowered price, so the combined effect is always a little less than simple addition suggests.
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Each discount multiplies rather than adds. Convert both percentages to "keep" factors (1 − discount÷100), multiply the two factors together, then multiply by the initial price: new price = initial price × (1 − r1) × (1 − r2). The order you apply the two discounts in doesn't matter — multiplication works the same either way.
The combined discount is always a little less than simply adding the two percentages, because the second discount shrinks an already-reduced price. Two 10% discounts combine to 19% off, not 20%; two 20% discounts combine to 36%, not 40%. The bigger the individual percentages, the wider that gap gets.
This calculator handles exactly two sequential percentage discounts on the same item. For a third discount layered on top, use the Triple Discount calculator. It doesn't account for flat dollar-amount coupons or sales tax, which can be applied before or after the discounts depending on the retailer.
Use this before assuming "stackable" store promotions add up the way the marketing implies. If you're deciding between a single bigger discount and two smaller stacked ones, run both through this calculator (or the Percent Off calculator for the single-discount case) to see which actually saves more.
Example: A $100 item gets two 10% discounts, one after another. First discount: $100 × 0.90 = $90. Second discount: $90 × 0.90 = $81. The combined discount is 19%, not 20% — because the second 10% applied to $90, not the original $100.
No — two 20% discounts don't make 40% off. Each discount applies to the already-discounted price, so the combined effect is always slightly less than the sum: two 20% discounts work out to 36% off, not 40%.
New price = initial price × (1 − discount 1 ÷ 100) × (1 − discount 2 ÷ 100). Multiply the two "keep" factors together, then multiply by the starting price.
No — multiplication is commutative, so applying a 20% discount then a 10% discount gives the exact same final price as applying the 10% first. Only the two percentages matter, not the sequence.