Startup Cost Calculator
A line-item budget that keeps the two questions separate: what it costs to open, and what it costs every month to stay open. The headline output is the cash needed to launch and survive a chosen runway with no revenue at all — the deliberately pessimistic figure lenders actually ask about.
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Estimate only — not tax, legal, or accounting advice. This is the published math for startup cost calculator. Confirm final figures with your payroll provider, accountant, or the state agency before acting on them.
Cash to open and survive 6 months
$14,620
One-off costs
$5,800
Monthly burn
$1,470
Runway assumes no revenue at all, which is deliberately pessimistic. It is the figure that answers "how long can this survive if nothing sells", and it is the one lenders ask about.
Startup Cost Calculator: computed in your browser; nothing is transmitted.
Method: Cash needed = one-off costs + (monthly costs × runway months), with no revenue assumed. Pinned in tests/llcCost.test.ts.
🎓 Understand this tool
What it is
A budget builder that splits opening costs from operating costs and answers the question lenders actually ask: how much cash does it take to open the doors and keep them open for a chosen number of months if nothing sells.
How it works
Each line item is marked one-off or monthly. One-off items are summed once; monthly items are multiplied by the runway; and the headline figure is the two added together, with no revenue assumed anywhere.
Getting the most from it
- List everything you must buy before opening, and mark it one-off.
- List everything that bills monthly whether or not you sell — rent, insurance, software, minimum marketing.
- Choose the runway you would need if the first months produced nothing.
- Check the monthly-burn figure against the break-even calculator: the two tools describe the same business from opposite ends.
Reading your result
The cash-needed figure is deliberately pessimistic, and that is its value: a plan that survives zero revenue for the runway survives a slow start. The monthly burn is the number to watch after opening — it is what each month costs you before the first sale.
What it can't tell you
It does not model revenue, seasonality, or growth — the break-even calculator takes over where this stops. And it prices what you list: a cost you forget is a cost it cannot count, which is why the starter rows exist to be edited rather than trusted.
Frequently asked questions
The monthly ones. Equipment and formation fees are visible because they are paid once and early; the quiet killers are the recurring costs — rent, insurance, software, minimum marketing — multiplied by the months before revenue covers them. That multiplication is the whole reason this calculator asks for a runway.
Related calculators
LLC cost
What an LLC costs to form and keep, state by state, from fee schedules we verified at each Secretary of State: the filing fee, the annual report and when it is due, franchise taxes that dwarf cheap filing fees, and what forming out of state actually adds. Year-one and multi-year totals, computed rather than tabled.
Break-even
Work out how many units you need to sell before the business covers its costs. Charts the crossing point, counts your own pay as a cost, includes the card fees and refunds most calculators leave out, and separates cash break-even from the accounting one. A planning estimate from your own figures.
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