Ad Spend & ROI Calculator documentation

The Ad Spend & ROI Calculator turns a monthly budget into clicks, leads or sales, revenue, ROAS, ROI and profit for Google Ads and Meta Ads. This guide explains every input, default and formula, so you can trust the numbers and shape them to your own business.

Open the Ad Spend & ROI Calculator

What it does

The calculator answers two questions: how much should you spend on ads, and are your current ads making money? It covers Google Ads and Meta Ads (Facebook and Instagram) across 26 industries, 58 countries and 48 currencies, in two modes:

• Plan a budget forecasts one month from a budget and editable assumptions, with break-even points, a budget for a customer goal and a what-if table.
• Check my results turns the spend, clicks, conversions and revenue from your ad account into ROAS, ROI, profit and break-even ROAS.

Lead businesses (18 industries, such as dentists, legal and real estate) get enquiries, and a share become customers. Online stores (8 industries: e-commerce, fashion, electronics, furniture, travel, events, pets and nonprofits) sell directly, so every sale is a customer.

Every benchmark is a rounded starting estimate, and every number is editable.

Quick start

1. Open the Ad Spend & ROI Calculator. It starts in Plan a budget mode.
2. Under Your market, check the country and pick your industry. Amounts are in US dollars unless you choose another currency.
3. Choose Google Ads, Meta Ads or Compare both.
4. Enter your monthly budget, average deal or order value, gross margin and, for a lead business, the share of leads that become customers.
5. Replace the cost per click, click-through rate and conversion rate with your own account numbers if you have them.
6. Read the forecast, then press Copy share link to save or send it.

Already running ads? Switch to Check my results and enter the figures from Google Ads or Meta Ads Manager.

Every option explained

Your market

Budget and business (Plan a budget)

Every number field starts empty. Fields with an estimate show it in grey (for example Estimate: 40), and the calculator uses that estimate until you type your own number. The forecast appears as soon as you enter a monthly budget.

India: ads carry 18% GST, so enter 18 in the tax field. If your business claims that GST back as input credit, leave it empty, because then it is not a real cost.

Ad assumptions and campaign types

For each platform you pick a campaign type and can edit cost per click, click-through rate (CTR) and conversion rate. Starting CPC = industry CPC in USD × type factor × country cost level × exchange rate, rounded to 2 decimals (whole numbers from 100). CTR is the type's fixed figure, or else the industry CTR. Conversion rate = industry rate × type factor.

Leave these empty to use the estimates shown in grey. Clear my numbers empties every field you typed in. Your ad numbers also clear when you change the industry, country, currency or a campaign type, because the estimates change with them.

Check my results

Enter Ad spend (before tax) as Google Ads or Ads Manager shows it, Revenue from ads and Gross margin (the industry margin is used while it is empty). Clicks and leads or sales are optional but needed for CPC, conversion rate and cost per lead or sale. Empty fees and tax count as 0; enter 18 for India's GST unless you claim it back.

Reading the results

Plan a budget

The top row shows monthly ad spend (tax included, fees noted), profit or loss, leads or sales, revenue, ROAS and ROI, then a verdict: profitable, at break-even, or not profitable yet. Each platform card adds impressions, clicks, new customers (lead model), cost per lead or sale and CPM.

• Break-even points: break-even ROAS, the most you can pay per lead or sale and, for leads, per new customer. These are before tax, like the platforms report. Fees come on top.
• Budget for a goal: the monthly budget, including tax, for your target number of new customers.
• If you change the budget: results at 0.5x, 1x, 1.5x, 2x and 3x your budget.
• What would make it work: appears only when the forecast loses money.

Check my results

You see spend (plus total cost with tax and fees), profit or loss, revenue, ROAS, ROI and break-even ROAS, and your cost per click and conversion rate beside typical figures for your industry and country (Meta when Meta Ads is selected, otherwise Google).

How it works

Platform metrics (CPC, CPM, cost per lead or sale, ROAS) use media spend, the part of the budget that reaches the auction, so they match what Google Ads and Meta report. Profit and ROI use the full cost, including tax and fees.

In Check my results, total cost = spend × (1 + tax) + fees, profit = revenue × margin − total cost, ROAS = revenue ÷ spend, ROI = profit ÷ total cost × 100, CPC = spend ÷ clicks and conversion rate = conversions ÷ clicks × 100.

Scaling in the what-if table

Auctions cost more as you buy more clicks, so each row multiplies CPC by the budget multiple to the power 0.15: about 9.9% lower at 0.5x, 6.3% higher at 1.5x, 11% at 2x and 17.9% at 3x. Fees stay fixed. Budget for a goal skips this, so treat it as a floor.

What would make it work

When a platform loses money but earns some gross profit, the tool sets k = full cost ÷ gross profit. Since profit moves in a straight line with conversion rate and with 1 ÷ CPC, break-even needs the conversion rate × k, or a cost per click below CPC ÷ k. A total loss also shows the break-even ROAS at your margin, as a higher deal value, close rate or order value helps too.

Country cost levels and exchange rates

Each country has a rough cost-per-click level versus the United States (1 = same), from 1.0 for the United States and Switzerland down to 0.06 for Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal. India is 0.12. Deal values use the square root of this level, because prices vary less than auction costs.

Benchmarks are stored in USD and converted with live rates from a free public feed (open.er-api.com). The server keeps them for up to 12 hours and, after a failed fetch, waits 15 minutes before retrying. Without live rates, built-in approximate rates dated 12 October 2026 are used and the label reads "Approximate rates".

Where the benchmarks come from

They are rounded US starting estimates. Where a figure is published, the code follows the WordStream / LocaliQ Google Ads search benchmarks (US search campaigns, April 2024 to March 2025: all-industry CTR 6.66%, CPC $5.26, conversion rate 7.52%) and public Meta studies (WordStream lead ads CPC about $1.92; Triple Whale e-commerce accounts: CTR about 2.2%, conversion rate about 1.6%). Other industries are estimated in line with those.

Worked example

An Indian clinic plans Google Ads only with a ₹59,000 budget, 18% tax, ₹10,000 fees, ₹25 CPC, 5% CTR, 5% conversion rate, 20% close rate, ₹15,000 deal value and 40% margin.

• Media spend: 59,000 ÷ 1.18 = ₹50,000 (₹9,000 is GST)
• Clicks: 50,000 ÷ 25 = 2,000. Impressions: 2,000 ÷ 0.05 = 40,000
• Leads: 2,000 × 5% = 100. Customers: 100 × 20% = 20
• Revenue: 20 × 15,000 = ₹3,00,000. Gross profit at 40%: ₹1,20,000
• Profit: 1,20,000 − (59,000 + 10,000) = ₹51,000
• CPM ₹1,250, cost per lead ₹500, ROAS 3,00,000 ÷ 50,000 = 6.00x, ROI 51,000 ÷ 69,000 = 74%
• Break-even ROAS: 1.18 ÷ 0.40 = 2.95x. Most per customer: 15,000 × 0.40 ÷ 1.18 = ₹5,085. Most per lead: × 20% = ₹1,017
• Budget for 30 customers: 150 leads ÷ 5% = 3,000 clicks × ₹25 × 1.18 = ₹88,500
• At 2x: CPC 25 × 1.1096 = ₹27.74, giving 3,605 clicks, 180 leads, 5.41x ROAS and ₹88,300 profit

The same spend, clicks, leads and revenue in Check my results give the same 6.00x ROAS and 74% ROI.

Tips for the best results

• Swap the estimates for your own cost per click, click-through rate and conversion rate once your account has data.
• Use your true gross margin. A strong ROAS can still lose money; break-even ROAS is the real target.
• Take the close rate from your CRM or sales records.
• Pick the campaign type you will actually run. Display and Awareness bring cheap clicks but far fewer conversions.
• With Compare both, move the split to see which platform wins customers at a lower acquisition cost.
• Check the what-if table before you scale.
• If the forecast shows a loss, look at your landing page and average order value first.

Would you like my team at Thetechhacker to look over your plan? Get in touch.

Limits, privacy and fair use

• The calculator is free and needs no sign-up.
• Every calculation runs in your browser. The page asks the server only for exchange rates and its help text; none of your numbers are sent.
• Nothing you type is saved. A reload brings back the estimates unless you open a share link.
• A share link puts your inputs in the web address, so anyone with it sees them. In Check my results it leaves out fees.
• Exchange rates can be up to 12 hours old, and the fallback rates are approximate.
• The model is simple on purpose: one month, one average value, no repeat purchases, and no overlap between platforms claiming the same sale.
• These are estimates, not promises. Results depend on your offer, landing page, tracking and competition.

Troubleshooting

• My numbers reset after I changed the industry, country, currency or campaign type. Those changes load fresh estimates on purpose. Copy the share link first, then re-enter your figures.
• My numbers changed just after the page opened. Live rates arrived and refreshed the estimates. Wait for the rate label, then type. Share links with a budget are never overwritten.
• It says "Approximate rates". The rate feed was unreachable, so built-in rates are used. The tool still works; try again later.
• Shopping is missing. Google Shopping is offered only for online-store industries.
• I cannot type a comma or minus sign. Fields accept digits and a decimal point only. Type 118000, not 1,18,000.
• Break-even ROAS shows n/a. Gross margin is 0.
• Budget for a goal shows n/a. The conversion rate or close rate is 0.
• Cost per lead or sale shows a dash. There are no conversions. In Check my results, fill in clicks and leads or sales.
• It asks me to enter ad spend and revenue. Check my results needs a spend above 0.
• ROAS looks good but it says not profitable yet. ROAS is below break-even ROAS, or fees outweigh gross profit.
• Copy share link opened a box. Your browser blocked the clipboard. Copy the link from the box.

All tool documentation