Free Markup Calculator
for Contractors
Put in what the job costs you and the markup you want. See the price to charge, your profit, and the margin that markup really gives you.
Labor, materials & fees · Markup, margin or price · Your numbers stay in your browser
Margin here is before overhead. Your numbers stay in your browser and aren't saved or sent anywhere.
How to use the markup calculator
- 1
Add your costs
Enter what the job costs you: labor, materials, and any subs, permits or fees. Leave out anything that doesn't apply.
- 2
Enter your markup
Type the markup you normally use. Or switch to Margin or Price if that's the number you already have.
- 3
Read the real result
You get the price to charge, your profit, and the margin that markup actually gives you, compared with your target.
The markup formula
Markup is what you add on top of your cost, as a percentage of that cost:
Price = cost × (1 + markup ÷ 100)
Markup % = (price − cost) ÷ cost × 100
So a job that costs you $2,000 with a 30% markup is priced at $2,000 × 1.30 = $2,600, and leaves you $600 before overhead.
Why your markup isn't your margin
Both numbers describe the same $600. Markup measures it against what you spent ($600 ÷ $2,000 = 30%). Margin measures it against what the customer paid ($600 ÷ $2,600 = 23.1%). Because the price is always bigger than the cost, your margin is always the smaller number.
This is where a lot of underpriced work comes from. If you know you need to keep 30% of every job and you add 30% to your costs, you end up with 23.1%. On that $2,000 job, you're $257.14 short of where you meant to be, and it never shows up on the quote. To keep a true 30%, the markup has to be 42.9%. There's more on working this through in how to calculate contractor markup.
Markup to margin chart
What each common markup really leaves you, as a share of the price:
| Markup on cost | Margin on price |
|---|---|
| 10% | 9.1% |
| 15% | 13% |
| 20% | 16.7% |
| 25% | 20% |
| 30% | 23.1% |
| 40% | 28.6% |
| 50% | 33.3% |
| 60% | 37.5% |
| 75% | 42.9% |
| 100% | 50% |
What markup should a contractor use?
There's no single right number, because the markup has to pay for your overhead and your profit, and those differ from one business to the next. A crew with two trucks and a shop needs more than one person working out of a van.
The better way is to work backwards. Decide the margin the business needs, then look up the markup that gets you there. As a rule of thumb, trades businesses often need a gross margin of 30–50% on quoted work, which works out to a markup of about 43–100%. Treat that as a starting point and check it against your own numbers.
You don't have to use one rate for everything, either. Many contractors put a different markup on materials than on labor, and the material markup guide covers how to set it. What matters is that the whole job lands on the margin you need.
What this calculator leaves out
The result only covers the costs you enter, so it's your gross margin. Your truck, insurance, tools, office and the hours you don't bill all still come out of that profit. If you want the job to carry its share, either include it in your labor rate or set your target margin high enough to cover it. The guide to pricing contractor jobs goes through how.
See it on a real quote
A calculator handles one job total, but a markup goes wrong line by line. The free quote generator lets you enter costs on each line and watch the margin change as you build the quote, then download the PDF. If you already think in margin, try the profit margin calculator.
Questions
- Subtract your cost from the price, divide by the cost, and multiply by 100. A job that costs $2,000 and sells for $2,600 has a markup of $600 ÷ $2,000 × 100 = 30%. To go the other way, multiply your cost by 1 plus the markup: $2,000 × 1.30 = $2,600.
- Markup is profit as a percentage of your cost. Margin is profit as a percentage of the price. The same job can have a 30% markup and a 23.1% margin, so the two can't be swapped.
- No. A 100% markup means you charge double your cost, which is a 50% margin. Half of the price is profit before overhead, and the other half covered your costs.
- Yes, your labor needs to carry its share of overhead and profit too. Some contractors build that into their hourly rate and mark up only materials, and others mark up both. Either works as long as the total job reaches the margin you need.
- It's free and doesn't need an account. Everything is worked out in your browser, and your numbers aren't saved or sent anywhere.
See this on every quote
QuoTrak shows your margin as you build each quote, measured against a target you set. Free plan, no credit card.