Profit & margin

Profit Margin & Markup Calculator

Enter what something costs and what you sell it for — or the margin or markup you're aiming at — and see exactly how much you keep on every sale.

Profit margin & markup calculator

Pick what you already know, and we'll work out the rest — profit, margin and markup, side by side.

Cost ($)What one item or job costs you, including materials, labor and any overhead.Selling price ($)What your customer pays for it, before sales tax.

Margin versus markup explained

Margin and markup describe the same dollar of profit from two different starting points. Margin measures profit against the selling price. Markup measures the same profit against the cost. Because the selling price is always bigger than the cost, markup always looks like the larger number.

Mixing them up is the single most common pricing mistake. If you add 30% to your cost believing you've secured a 30% margin, you've actually got a 23% margin — and you may have quietly given away a third of your intended profit.

The formulas

Profit = Selling price − Cost
Profit margin % = Profit ÷ Selling price × 100
Markup % = Profit ÷ Cost × 100
Price from a target margin = Cost ÷ (1 − margin ÷ 100)
Price from a target markup = Cost × (1 + markup ÷ 100)

Notice that the margin formula divides while the markup formula multiplies. That single difference is why the two numbers never match.

Comparison table

Every row below starts from the same $10 cost, so you can see how margin and markup drift apart as prices rise.

Cost	Price	Profit	Margin	Markup
$10	$12.50	$2.50	20%	25%
$10	$15.00	$5.00	33.3%	50%
$10	$16.67	$6.67	40%	66.7%
$10	$20.00	$10.00	50%	100%
$10	$25.00	$15.00	60%	150%

Worked examples

Cost and selling price. An item costs $20.00 and sells for $35.00. Profit is $15.00, the margin is 42.9% ($15 ÷ $35) and the markup is 75% ($15 ÷ $20).

Cost and desired margin. The same $20.00 item with a 40% target margin needs a price of $20 ÷ 0.60 = $33.33, giving $13.33 of profit and a 66.7% markup.

Cost and desired markup. Adding a 75% markup to $20.00 gives $35.00 — the same price as the first example, and a reminder that a 75% markup is only a 42.9% margin. Load the sample numbers above to see each mode live.

Common mistakes

Adding a percentage to cost and calling the result a margin.
Leaving your own labor out of the cost figure.
Ignoring payment, marketplace and shipping fees when working out true profit.
Comparing your margin to a competitor whose costs you can't see.
Chasing an impossible margin of 100% or more.
Never revisiting prices after supplier costs rise.

Frequently asked questions

Is margin or markup the better number to use?

Use margin when you're deciding whether your business is healthy, because it tells you what share of every dollar of revenue you keep. Use markup when you're setting a price from a known cost, which is how most suppliers and buyers talk.

Why can't I have a 100% profit margin?

A 100% margin would mean your cost is zero. As you push a desired margin towards 100%, the required selling price rises towards infinity, so the calculator asks for a margin below 100%.

Can markup be more than 100%?

Yes. A 200% markup simply means you sell for three times your cost. Markup has no ceiling, which is another reason it's easy to confuse with margin.

Should transaction fees be part of my cost?

If you want a true picture, yes. Either add fees into the cost field here, or use the product pricing calculator, which handles percentage and fixed fees separately.

Is my data saved anywhere?

No. Every calculation runs in your browser. Nothing is stored, sent or shared.

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