Free online tool · Planning
Break-even calculator
How many sales would cover the cost of being open? Turn your price and costs into a monthly target, then compare that target with expected sales and capacity.
No account required. Your entries stay in this page’s memory. This calculator does not send them to a server or save them to an account or browser storage.
Monthly scenario · amounts in your chosen currency
Your sales target under these assumptions
Fixed costs: 9,000.00 · Price per unit: 120.00 · Variable cost per unit: 45.00
- Contribution per sale
- 75.00
- Break-even sales per month
- 120
- Revenue at that target
- 14,400.00
Each sale leaves 120.00 − 45.00 = 75.00 toward fixed costs. Divide 9,000.00 by 75.00 and round up to a whole sale: 120 units per month.
Contribution is 62.5% of the selling price. The whole-unit target may leave a small surplus when the exact calculation falls between two sales.
At 150 expected sales: a surplus of 2,250.00 after the included variable and fixed costs. This is 75.00 × 150 − 9,000.00; it is not necessarily final accounting profit or available cash.
Capacity check: The target fits within your stated capacity of 160 units, leaving 40 units of headroom. Capacity does not establish customer demand.
Try another price, variable cost or monthly cost to compare a different scenario. Increasing capacity may also increase fixed costs, so update both assumptions together.
What belongs in each amount?
Fixed costs are the costs you expect to pay for the month within the capacity you are testing, such as rent and a regular software subscription. Variable costs are the costs that change with one more unit, such as materials, packaging and relevant transaction fees. Labor may behave differently depending on staffing and scheduling. Use a consistent definition and do not put the same cost in both amounts.
Include the costs you need the scenario to cover, and record what remains outside it. If you include an allowance for your own work, identify it explicitly; this calculator does not determine the tax or accounting treatment of an owner's payment.
A worked appointment example
A fictional service business charges 120 per appointment and uses 45 in costs that vary with that appointment. Each appointment contributes 75. With 9,000 of monthly fixed costs, 9,000 ÷ 75 = 120 appointments, producing revenue of 14,400. At 150 appointments, the result after these included costs is 2,250. A stated capacity of 160 appointments makes the target possible on paper; it does not prove that 120 customers will book.
Where this calculation stops
The calculation assumes one product or service—or a stable, representative sales mix—with an unchanged price and variable cost per unit. If you sell different products at different margins, calculate a defensible weighted mix or work through them separately. Do not use a simple average if the volumes differ.
The target is rounded up to whole units. For a business that sells fractional quantities, choose a smaller consistent unit. Costs may jump when you need another worker, shift, vehicle, or location; rerun the scenario at that new cost level.
Covering costs is different from having cash when a bill is due. Customer payment delays, inventory purchases, loan principal, taxes and equipment payments can create a cash need even at break-even. Use the 13-week cash workbook to examine payment timing.
Keep working on the decision
Read the full break-even guide for fixed and variable costs, mixed sales and capacity. Use the margin and markup calculator to understand your price, then read how to assess capacity before accepting more work.