Inflation Rate in Singapore: Current, Average & Historical (2026)

When planning your finances, the inflation rate matters more than almost any other number.

It tells you whether your investment strategies are outpacing rising prices, and it determines how much your retirement or your children’s university education will really cost by the time you get there.

But how much has the cost of living actually increased over the years? What is the inflation rate in Singapore right now, and what has it averaged over the long run?

Let’s start with where things stand right now, then zoom out to the long-run picture.

Summary of Key Findings

All figures are computed from Singapore Department of Statistics CPI data (2024 as base year), as of the July 2026 release.

• Singapore’s headline inflation rate was 2.2% year on year in July 2026, while MAS Core Inflation was 2.0%
• For 2025 as a whole, headline inflation was 0.9% and core inflation was 0.7%
• Headline inflation averaged 1.72% per year over the last 10 years (2015 to 2025), 2.14% over the last 20 years, and 1.68% over the last 30 years; core inflation averaged 1.76%, 1.88%, and 1.63% over the same three windows
• SmartWealth’s analysis of official CPI data from 1961 to 2025 puts Singapore’s long-run average inflation rate at 2.49% per year
• What cost $10,000 in 2000 costs about $15,780 in 2025
• MAS expects both headline and core inflation to average 1.5% to 2.5% in 2026

What Is the Current Inflation Rate in Singapore? (2026)

Singapore’s headline inflation rate (CPI All-Items) was 2.2% year on year in July 2026, while MAS Core Inflation was 2.0%, based on the latest consumer price data released on 24 August 2026. This is the highest headline reading in nearly two years.

On a month-on-month basis, the CPI rose 0.3% in July 2026.

Inflation has picked up from the unusually low readings of 2025, when headline inflation spent most of the year below 1%. Here are the monthly figures for the last two years:

Month	Headline Inflation (y-o-y)	Core Inflation (y-o-y)	Headline (m-o-m)
Jul 2026	2.2%	2.0%	0.3%
Jun 2026	1.9%	1.6%	0.0%
May 2026	1.8%	1.4%	0.7%
Apr 2026	1.8%	1.4%	-0.3%
Mar 2026	1.8%	1.7%	0.5%
Feb 2026	1.2%	1.4%	0.6%
Jan 2026	1.4%	1.0%	-0.5%
Dec 2025	1.2%	1.2%	0.3%
Nov 2025	1.2%	1.2%	0.2%
Oct 2025	1.2%	1.2%	0.0%
Sep 2025	0.7%	0.4%	0.4%
Aug 2025	0.5%	0.3%	0.5%
Jul 2025	0.6%	0.5%	-0.4%
Jun 2025	0.8%	0.6%	-0.1%
May 2025	0.8%	0.6%	0.7%
Apr 2025	0.9%	0.7%	-0.3%
Mar 2025	0.9%	0.5%	-0.1%
Feb 2025	0.9%	0.6%	0.8%
Jan 2025	1.2%	0.8%	-0.7%
Dec 2024	1.5%	1.7%	0.3%
Nov 2024	1.6%	1.9%	0.3%
Oct 2024	1.2%	2.1%	-0.5%
Sep 2024	1.9%	2.8%	0.2%
Aug 2024	2.2%	2.7%	0.6%

Monthly data are from the SingStat CPI series (year-on-year and month-on-month changes). New figures are released around the 23rd of each month, and we update this page after each release.

What Is Inflation?

Inflation is the rise in the general level of prices of goods and services over time.

While prices in Singapore rise most of the time, negative inflation, or deflation, can happen too. It last occurred in 2020, and before that in 2015 and 2016.

According to the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), low and stable inflation is a core condition for long-term sustainable economic growth. Extreme rates in either direction, whether runaway inflation or persistent deflation, are unfavourable for the economy.

What Is the Consumer Price Index (CPI)?

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) measures the change in prices over time of a fixed basket of goods and services typically consumed by resident households. It is the key indicator used to track inflation in Singapore.

The CPI is compiled by the Singapore Department of Statistics (DOS). The current series uses 2024 as the base year, with the basket’s weights derived from the Household Expenditure Survey 2023.

There are 11 main categories tracked in the current CPI basket:

1. Food
2. Clothing & Footwear
3. Housing & Utilities
4. Household Durables & Services
5. Health
6. Transport
7. Information & Communication
8. Recreation, Sport & Culture
9. Education
10. Miscellaneous Goods & Services
11. Food & Beverage Serving Services (eating out)

Because not all goods and services take up the same share of household spending, each category carries a different weight in the index. Prices are collected from a wide range of sources, including retail outlets, administrative records, and web-scraped data.

Headline vs Core Inflation: What Is the Difference?

The difference is that CPI All-Items inflation (also called headline or overall inflation) measures price changes across the entire basket, all 11 categories, while MAS Core Inflation strips out Accommodation and Private Transport.

These two components are excluded because they swing with the property rental market and Certificate of Entitlement (COE) prices, and they don’t form part of the everyday out-of-pocket expenses of most households, since around 9 in 10 resident households own their homes.

Core inflation is therefore a better gauge of day-to-day price pressure, while headline inflation captures the full picture. The two measures can diverge in the short run but tend to converge over the long run.

For example, if headline inflation rises by 1% while core inflation rises by 4%, everyday expenses are climbing much faster than the headline number suggests, and the gap is being masked by soft rentals or car prices.

To measure inflation in a specific area of spending, you would look at the CPI for that category instead, such as education or healthcare.

How to Calculate the Inflation Rate

The inflation rate is the percentage change in the CPI over a specified period, usually a year.

Here’s the formula for the yearly inflation rate:

Inflation Rate = ((CPI of current year) − (CPI of previous year)) / (CPI of previous year) × 100

To illustrate with real figures, the CPI All-Items index was 100 in 2024 and 100.903 in 2025, which works out to (100.903 − 100) / 100 × 100 = 0.9% for 2025.

What Is the Average Annual Inflation Rate in Singapore?

Over the last 10 years (2015 to 2025), Singapore’s headline inflation averaged 1.72% per year, and core inflation averaged 1.76% per year.

Period	Average Headline Inflation Rate (CPI All-Items)	Average Core Inflation Rate (MAS Core Inflation)
Last 10 years (2015 to 2025)	1.72%	1.76%
Last 20 years (2005 to 2025)	2.14%	1.88%
Last 30 years (1995 to 2025)	1.68%	1.63%
Since 1961 (headline only)	2.49%	na

You might notice the 20-year average sits above both the 10-year and the 30-year. That is not an error: the 2005 to 2025 window captures the inflation spikes of 2008 and 2011 to 2013, the 10-year window leaves them out, and the 30-year window dilutes them with the low-inflation late 1990s.

In financial planning, the most common use for an average inflation rate is projecting future costs. You can’t take your current expenses and assume they’ll stay the same decades from now.

A note on the maths: you can’t simply add up the annual inflation rates and divide by the number of years. Because inflation compounds, the correct approach is the compound average (CAGR), using the formula PV (1+r)^n = FV, where PV and FV are the CPI index values at the start and end of the period, and n is the number of years. All the averages on this page are computed this way.

Average inflation by decade

The long-run average of around 2.5% hides how different each decade has been.

Decade	Average Annual Headline Inflation
1960s (1961 to 1970)	1.17%
1970s (1970 to 1980)	6.39%
1980s (1980 to 1990)	2.23%
1990s (1990 to 2000)	1.72%
2000s (2000 to 2010)	1.62%
2010s (2010 to 2020)	1.34%
2020s so far (2020 to 2025)	3.30%

The 1970s stand out because of the two global oil shocks, when annual inflation hit 19.6% in 1973 and 22.4% in 1974, the highest ever recorded in Singapore. From the 1980s to the 2010s, each decade was calmer than the last. The 2020s have broken that pattern so far, averaging 3.30% per year from 2020 to 2025, driven by the post-pandemic surge of 2022 and 2023.

Historical Inflation Rates in Singapore by Year (1962 to 2025)

Singapore’s inflation rate was 0.9% in 2025. Over the past 30 years, the highest annual rate was 6.6% in 2008 and the lowest was -0.5% in 2015 and 2016.

Here is the full year-by-year history, computed from the official CPI series (core inflation is published from 1991):

Year	Headline Inflation (%)	Core Inflation (%)
2025	0.9	0.7
2024	2.4	2.8
2023	4.8	4.2
2022	6.1	4.1
2021	2.3	0.9
2020	-0.2	-0.1
2019	0.6	1.0
2018	0.4	1.7
2017	0.6	1.5
2016	-0.5	0.9
2015	-0.5	0.5
2014	1.0	2.0
2013	2.4	1.7
2012	4.6	2.6
2011	5.3	2.2
2010	2.8	1.5
2009	0.6	0.0
2008	6.6	5.7
2007	2.1	2.2
2006	1.0	1.7
2005	0.5	1.3
2004	1.7	2.0
2003	0.5	0.9
2002	-0.4	-0.1
2001	1.0	1.6
2000	1.3	1.5
1999	0.0	0.5
1998	-0.3	0.4
1997	2.0	1.5
1996	1.4	1.8
1995	1.7	2.2
1994	3.1	2.5
1993	2.3	1.8
1992	2.2	1.6
1991	3.4	3.7
1990	3.5	na
1989	2.3	na
1988	1.5	na
1987	0.5	na
1986	-1.4	na
1985	0.5	na
1984	2.6	na
1983	1.0	na
1982	3.9	na
1981	8.2	na
1980	8.5	na
1979	4.0	na
1978	4.1	na
1977	3.2	na
1976	-1.9	na
1975	2.6	na
1974	22.4	na
1973	19.6	na
1972	2.1	na
1971	1.9	na
1970	0.3	na
1969	-0.1	na
1968	0.7	na
1967	3.2	na
1966	2.0	na
1965	0.2	na
1964	1.6	na
1963	2.1	na
1962	0.4	na

The table begins in 1962 rather than 1961 because a yearly inflation rate needs the previous year’s index to calculate, and the CPI series itself starts in 1961. That 1961 starting point is what the long-run average of 2.49% on this page is measured from.

From 2005 to 2025, the CPI All-Items index rose 52.8% in total, while the MAS Core Inflation index rose 45.0%. Put another way, a $10 basket of regular day-to-day expenses in 2005 would cost about $14.50 in 2025.

What Would $10,000 in the Past Be Worth Today?

What cost $10,000 in 2000 costs about $15,780 in 2025, based on the change in the CPI All-Items index.

Year	What Cost $10,000 Then Costs This in 2025	What $10,000 Cash From Then Now Buys (in That Year’s Dollars)
1970	$43,375	$2,305
1980	$23,345	$4,284
1990	$18,721	$5,342
2000	$15,780	$6,337
2010	$13,436	$7,443
2020	$11,761	$8,503

Read the middle column as the rising cost of living, and the right column as what happens to money that sits idle. A sum of $10,000 tucked away in 1990 and left as cash now buys only what about $5,342 would have bought back in 1990, close to half its real value gone.

This is why holding large amounts of cash over long periods carries a real, if invisible, cost, even in a low-inflation country like Singapore.

Inflation Rate by Category (Food, Transport, Healthcare & More)

Overall inflation hides big differences between spending categories. Over the 10 years from 2015 to 2025, transport prices rose fastest and housing & utilities slowest, based on the category-level CPI indices compiled by DOS.

Category	Average Annual Inflation (2015 to 2025)	Total Increase Over 10 Years
Transport	3.33%	38.8%
Food & Beverage Serving Services (eating out)	2.56%	28.7%
Food (groceries)	2.48%	27.7%
Education	2.06%	22.7%
Health	1.96%	21.4%
Housing & Utilities	0.53%	5.4%

A few things stand out from the 10-year figures:

Transport inflation of 38.8% largely reflects the cost of private transport, where COE premiums drive car prices. Eating out has become noticeably dearer, with hawker and restaurant prices up 28.7% over the decade.

The official Health category tracks consumer prices for medical goods and services, but it understates what most families experience, because medical bills also grow with treatment intensity. We cover this in detail in our medical inflation rate analysis, and the same applies to the education inflation rate once private tuition and enrichment are factored in.

Singapore’s Inflation Rate Forecast (2026)

MAS and MTI expect both headline and core inflation to average 1.5% to 2.5% in 2026. This is an upward revision from the 1.0% to 2.0% range projected in the January 2026 monetary policy statement, reflecting firmer energy and services costs in the early part of the year.

Forecasts are not certainties, and the authorities revise them as conditions change, as this year’s mid-year revision shows. Treat the range as a planning guide, not a promise.

Why Is Singapore’s Inflation Rate So Low?

Singapore’s inflation averages are low mainly because of two things: a strong Singapore dollar policy that keeps imported prices in check, and the way the CPI basket differs from any one household’s actual spending.

That second point explains why the official numbers can feel much lower than your own experience of rising prices. One reason is perception. We tend to notice the items that jump in price (a plate of chicken rice, a cup of kopi) and overlook the many prices that stay flat or fall, such as telco plans and electronics.

Another reason is a limitation in how any CPI is built. The index tracks a fixed basket, but no household buys exactly that basket. If your spending skews towards the fast-rising categories above (a car, eating out, children’s education), your personal inflation rate is higher than the headline number.

Having said that, the data still provide meaningful insights, especially for long-term planning where the broad trend matters more than any single year.

How to Project Future Costs

The long-run averages sit around 2% or slightly above. For planning, we suggest building in a buffer and assuming 3% to 4% instead, so your plan still holds if inflation runs hotter than history suggests.

To estimate how much you need for retirement, take your expected retirement expenses in today’s dollars and apply an assumed inflation rate over the years until you retire. At 3% inflation, $1,000 of monthly expenses today becomes about $2,094 in 25 years. Our retirement planning calculator does this for you, and the same concept applies to calculating your children’s education fund.

Two other practical uses:

• Real returns: subtract inflation from an investment’s expected return to see its real growth. A 4% return during 2% inflation grows your purchasing power by roughly 2% a year.
• Cash erosion: $10,000 left in an account earning 0.05% per year, with inflation at 3%, has the purchasing power of only about $5,592 after 20 years.

What Can You Do About the Rising Cost of Living?

A moderate amount of inflation is normal in a growing economy, and Singapore’s long-term record of roughly 2.5% a year since 1961 is low by international standards.

But even low inflation compounds relentlessly, as the $10,000 table above shows. So it pays to prepare:

Firstly, make sure the right types of insurance plans are in place, so a health event doesn’t force you to draw down long-term savings at the worst time.

Next, keep sufficient emergency funds in cash, but not much more than that. Excess cash beyond your emergency fund and short-term commitments is where inflation quietly bites.

For money you won’t need for years, consider alternatives that have historically delivered returns above the average inflation rate. If you’re planning for your retirement, weigh up the options for investing your money based on your risk appetite and time horizon.

Inflation is not something to fear. It’s something to plan around, and the earlier you start, the more the compounding works for you instead of against you.