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DCF (Discounted Cash Flow) analysis is a valuation method that estimates the intrinsic value of a stock based on its expected future cash flows. The core idea is simple: a company is worth the sum of all the money it will generate in the future, discounted back to today's dollars.

This matters because stock prices fluctuate based on market sentiment, but intrinsic value is based on fundamentals. By comparing a stock's current price to its DCF fair value, you can identify whether it's potentially undervalued (a buying opportunity) or overvalued (a sell signal). Warren Buffett and many professional investors use DCF as a cornerstone of their investment process.

Just type any stock ticker and our calculator automatically loads years of historical financial data. No spreadsheets, no manual data entry. The calculator pre-fills growth rates based on actual historical performance, so you start with realistic assumptions rather than guessing.

The calculation follows a 5-step process: (1) Project your chosen financial metric forward using your growth assumptions, (2) Account for share count changes (buybacks or dilution), (3) Calculate future stock price using a terminal multiple, (4) Add projected dividends if applicable, and (5) Discount everything back to present value. You can click "How is this calculated?" to see the exact math with your numbers.

Stock Unlock supports 7 different valuation metrics to fit different company types and analysis preferences:

• Free Cash Flow (FCF) - Best for most mature companies. Shows actual cash available after capital expenditures.
• Operating Cash Flow (OCF) - Broader view of cash generation before capex.
• Net Income / Earnings - Classic profitability-based valuation.
• Operating Income - Focuses on core operational performance.
• EBIT - Earnings before interest and taxes, useful for comparing companies with different capital structures.
• EBITDA - Popular for capital-intensive industries where depreciation varies widely.
• Book Value - Asset-based valuation, particularly useful for banks and financial companies.

You can project anywhere from 1 to 10 years forward. The default is 5 years, which works well for most analyses, but you have full control to adjust based on your investment horizon and the company's predictability.

Keep in mind that longer projections involve more uncertainty. A 1-3 year projection might be appropriate for a rapidly changing tech company, while a 7-10 year projection might suit a stable utility or consumer staples company with predictable cash flows. Our Growth Decay feature helps model the reality that high growth rates typically slow over time.

The discount rate represents your required annual return. We default to 10%, which approximates the long-term average stock market return and serves as a reasonable hurdle rate for most investors.

You might use a higher discount rate (12-15%) for riskier, volatile stocks where you demand higher returns to compensate for uncertainty. For stable, blue-chip dividend stocks, a lower rate (8-10%) might be appropriate. Some investors use their personal required return, while others use a company's weighted average cost of capital (WACC). There's no single "correct" answer, which is why we let you adjust it.

DCF is a powerful framework, but it's only as accurate as your assumptions. The output is highly sensitive to growth rate and discount rate inputs. A small change in assumptions can significantly change the calculated fair value. That's a feature, not a bug. It forces you to think critically about what you actually believe will happen.

We recommend using DCF as one tool among several, not as a crystal ball. It works best for companies with predictable cash flows and less well for early-stage companies, cyclical businesses, or turnaround situations. Running multiple scenarios with different assumptions (bull case, bear case, base case) gives you a range of values rather than false precision.

Yes! You can use the DCF Calculator completely free without creating an account. Free users get 3 valuations per week on any stock. Featured stocks like AAPL, GOOG, NVDA, and JPM have unlimited free access so you can explore the tool fully.

Paid plans unlock unlimited valuations, deeper historical data (up to 35 years), and additional features like portfolio tracking with brokerage sync, advanced Stock Scores, and more. All paid plans include a 30-day money-back guarantee.

We built the easiest-to-use DCF calculator with the most optionality. While most tools offer 1-2 valuation metrics, we give you 7, plus Growth Decay modeling for realistic long-term projections that account for how growth naturally slows over time. No manual data entry: we automatically load historical financials for 170,000+ stocks and ETFs across 70+ global exchanges.

The DCF Calculator is part of Stock Unlock's larger ecosystem of investing tools (Stock Scores, screeners, dividend analysis, portfolio tracking), so you can dive deep on any investment from multiple angles. This combination is hard to find anywhere else, and most of our tools are free to try without even creating an account.