Depreciation Expense vs Accumulated Depreciation: What’s the Difference?

The simplest way to calculate this expense is to use the straight-line method. The formula for this is (cost of asset minus salvage value) divided by useful life. Accumulated depreciation of an asset is an important financial metric for the business as it reduces a firm’s value on the balance sheet. Financial analysts will create a depreciation schedule when performing financial modeling to track the total depreciation over an asset’s life. When an asset is disposed of (sold, retired, scrapped) the credit balance in Accumulated Depreciation is reduced when the asset’s credit balance is removed by debiting Accumulated Depreciation. Under the sum-of-the-years’ digits method, a company strives to record more depreciation earlier in the life of an asset and less in the later years.

The truck’s book value is $7,000, but nothing is received for it if it is discarded. Both account balances above must be set to zero to reflect the fact that the company no longer owns the truck. To record the transaction, debit Accumulated Depreciation for its $35,000 credit balance and credit Truck for its $35,000 debit balance. The truck is not worth anything, and nothing is received for it when it is discarded.

Debit and credit journal entry for depreciation expense on building

Of course, this also applies when the company makes an exchange of fixed assets to replace the old fixed assets with the new ones. For example, on Jan 1, the company ABC buys a piece of equipment that costs $5,000 to use in the business operation. The company estimates that the equipment has a useful life of 5 years with zero salvage value. The company’s policy in fixed asset management is to depreciate the equipment using the straight-line depreciation method. In other words, the depreciated amount in the formula above is the beginning balance of the accumulated depreciation on the balance sheet of the company.

Accumulated depreciation is a contra-asset account whose credit balance gets larger every year. Its credit balance, however, cannot exceed depreciation expense which is the cost of the asset being depreciated. For accounting purposes, the depreciation expense account is debited, and the accumulated depreciation is credited when recording depreciation. That is, when recording depreciation in the general ledger, a company has to debit depreciation expense and credit accumulated depreciation. Credits will cause an increase to some accounts such as the revenue, equity, and liability accounts while accounts like the expense and asset accounts will decrease by a credit entry. Debits, on the other hand, cause the balance of accounts such as the expense and asset accounts to increase while reducing accounts like liability, equity, and revenue accounts.

Accumulated Depreciation vs. Depreciation Expense

By having accumulated depreciation recorded as a credit balance, the fixed asset can be offset. In other words, accumulated depreciation is a contra-asset account, meaning it offsets the value of the asset that it is depreciating. As a result, accumulated depreciation is a negative balance reported on the balance sheet under the long-term assets section. Since fixed assets on the balance sheet have a debit balance, by recording accumulated depreciation as a credit balance, the fixed asset can be offset.

• The philosophy behind accelerated depreciation is assets that are newer (i.e. a new company vehicle) are often used more than older assets because they are in better condition and more efficient.
• For example, if a company purchased a piece of printing equipment for $100,000 and the accumulated depreciation is $35,000, then the net book value of the printing equipment is $65,000.
• A debit will always be positioned on the left side of the account and a credit on the right side of the account.

Subsequent years’ expenses will change based on the changing current book value. For example, in the second year, current book value would be $50,000 – $10,000, or $40,000. The four methods allowed by generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) are the aforementioned straight-line, declining balance, sum-of-the-years’ digits (SYD), and units of production. Accumulated depreciation totals depreciation expense since the asset has been in use. Tracking the depreciation expense of an asset is important for reporting purposes because it spreads the cost of the asset over the time it’s in use.

Straight-Line Method

For every transaction recorded, a debit entry has to have a credit entry that corresponds with it while equaling the exact amount. That is, for accounting purposes, the debit total and credits total for any bookkeeping example transaction must always equal each other so that the accounting transaction will be considered to be in balance. If this is not done accurately, it would be difficult to create financial statements.

When there are no proceeds from the sale of a fixed asset and the asset is fully depreciated, debit all accumulated depreciation and credit the fixed asset. Accumulated depreciation is a measure of the total wear on a company’s assets. In other words, it’s the total of all depreciation expenses incurred to date. Depreciation expense is not a current asset; it is reported on the income statement along with other normal business expenses. The Internal Revenue Service allows companies and individuals to depreciate equipment used for business purposes.

How Accumulated Depreciation Works

In other words, depreciation spreads out the cost of an asset over the years, allocating how much of the asset that has been used up in a year, until the asset is obsolete or no longer in use. Without depreciation, a company would incur the entire cost of an asset in the year of the purchase, which could negatively impact profitability. Business owners can claim a valuable tax deduction if they keep track of the accumulated depreciation of their eligible assets.

The yearly depreciation expense then adds to the balance of the accumulated depreciation account. So, as depreciation expenses continue to be recorded, the amount of accumulated depreciation for an asset or group of assets will increase over time. Therefore, leading to a decrease in the book value of fixed assets of the company until the book value of the asset becomes zero.