How do you split a restaurant bill by item?

List each item and its price, mark who ordered or shared it (a shared appetizer is split evenly between the people who ate it), then add the tax and tip. Each person pays for their own items plus a proportional share of tax and tip. This calculator does the math for you.

How should tax and tip be split on an itemized bill?

The fairest way is proportionally: whoever ordered more of the food pays more of the tax and tip. This tool divides tax and tip in proportion to each person's item subtotal, so nobody subsidises a bigger order.

How do I split a shared item between people?

Add the item once and tick everyone who shared it. Its price is divided equally among those people. A plate two people split costs each of them half; an appetizer for the whole table splits across everyone ticked.

Itemized Bill Splitter

Split a bill by who ordered what. ← splittab bill splitter

Who's splitting

Add everyone first, then add items and tap who shared each one.

Items

After adding an item, tap the names under it who shared it. Untick people who didn't.

Tax & tip

Tax amount

Tip

Tip 18% 20% 22% 25%

Tax and tip are split in proportion to what each person ordered.

Each person owes

Add people and items to see the split.

Bill total—

How to split a bill by item

An equal split isn't fair when people ordered very differently — one person's steak and cocktail shouldn't cost the same as another's soup. An itemized split fixes that: everyone pays for what they actually ordered, plus their fair share of tax and tip. Here's the flow:

Add everyone at the table. First names are enough.
Enter each item and its price straight off the receipt. For a dish two or more people shared, add it once and tap everyone who shared it — the price splits evenly between them.
Add the tax and the tip. Enter the tip as a dollar amount or tap a percentage. Both are divided proportionally, so whoever ordered more covers more of them.
Read each person's total. It updates live. Tap Copy share link to send the whole breakdown to the group, or Copy as text to paste it into a chat.

How tax and tip are split

Some groups divide tax and tip evenly, but that quietly overcharges the light eaters. The fair method — the one this tool uses — is proportional: your share of tax and tip matches your share of the food. If your items are 30% of the pre-tax total, you pay 30% of the tax and 30% of the tip. It nets out to exactly the bill, to the cent.

Step	What happens
1. Item subtotal per person	Each item's price is split evenly among the people who shared it, and summed per person.
2. Proportional tax & tip	Tax + tip is allocated in the same ratio as each person's item subtotal.
3. Person total	Item subtotal + their share of tax and tip. All person totals add up to the full bill.

Worked example

Ana orders a $24 pasta; Ben and Cy share a $30 pizza; everyone shares a $12 garlic bread. Subtotal $66. Add $6 tax and a 20% tip ($13.20). Ana's items = $24 + $4 (bread) = $28; Ben and Cy each = $15 (pizza) + $4 = $19. Tax + tip of $19.20 splits 28:19:19 → Ana ≈ $8.15, Ben ≈ $5.53, Cy ≈ $5.53. Totals: Ana ≈ $36.15, Ben ≈ $24.53, Cy ≈ $24.53 — which sum to the $85.20 bill.

When to use the other splitters

If everyone ate roughly the same and you just need the tip and per-head total, the tip calculator is quicker. If the tricky part isn't who ate what but who paid — several people fronting money over a trip or a house — use the main splitter, which nets out balances into the fewest payments. This page is for the classic restaurant receipt where the question is "who ordered what?".

FAQ

Question	Answer
Is it free?	Yes — no signup, nothing stored on a server. It runs entirely in your browser.
Can I share the split?	Yes. The whole itemized bill is packed into the page URL, so Copy share link sends everyone the exact breakdown.
What if an item had no one assigned?	It's flagged and left out of the totals until you tap who shared it, so nothing gets silently mischarged.
Does it handle shared plates?	Yes — add the item once and tick everyone who shared it; the price divides evenly between them.