Customer Acquisition Cost Calculator
Cost to acquire one customer.
Calculate customer acquisition cost from total marketing spend, sales spend, and the count of new customers gained in the period.
What this tool does
Customer acquisition cost (CAC) calculates the blended cost to acquire one new customer by dividing your combined marketing and sales spend by the number of new customers gained. Enter your total marketing spend (including salaries, tools, and advertising), sales spend, and count of new customers acquired over a defined period. The calculator returns your CAC in local terms — a single metric showing what each customer acquisition costs your organisation. This figure forms a baseline for comparing growth channels, understanding unit economics, and modelling scaling scenarios. The result assumes all spend drove acquisition and excludes retention, support, or product costs. Variations in customer lifetime value, conversion rates, and sales cycle length are not factored in. Use this output as an illustration of acquisition efficiency rather than a complete financial picture.
Enter Values
People also use
SaaS & Subscription
SaaS LTV:CAC Ratio Calculator
Calculate SaaS LTV-to-CAC ratio from MRR, gross margin, monthly churn, and customer acquisition cost, plus the implied payback months.
SaaS & Subscription
SaaS Payback Period Calculator
Calculate months needed to recover CAC from gross margin on ARPU. Enter customer acquisition cost and arpu monthly to see payback months.
SaaS & Subscription
Customer Churn Cost Calculator
Calculate annual revenue lost to customer churn using your customer count, monthly churn rate, and average revenue per user (ARPU).
Formula Used
Spotted something off?
Calculations or display — let us know.
Disclaimer
Results are estimates for educational purposes only. They do not constitute financial advice. Consult a qualified professional before making financial decisions.
CAC is total sales and marketing spend divided by the new customers those units brought in over the same period. Include every cost: salaries, tools, ads, commissions, events. Exclude spend on retention or upselling existing customers - that's not acquisition. The number lets you compare marketing efficiency across channels, across quarters, and against competitors.
100,000 marketing plus 50,000 sales = 150,000 total. If that generated 500 new customers, CAC is 300. Whether 300 is good depends entirely on what those customers pay back. A customer with 1,500 LTV gives 5:1 LTV:CAC - healthy. 400 LTV gives 1.3:1 - break-even at best.
Blended CAC hides channel-level truth. Paid ads might cost 500 per customer, SEO 50, referrals 20. Reporting just the 300 blended number makes it impossible to decide where to invest next. Track CAC by channel to spot which deserve more spend and which are saturated.
Quick example
With marketing spend of 100,000 and sales spend of 50,000 (plus new customers acquired of 500), the result is 300.00. Change any figure and watch the output shift — it's often more useful to see the pattern than to memorise the formula.
Which inputs matter most
You enter Marketing Spend, Sales Spend, and New Customers Acquired.
What's happening under the hood
CAC = (marketing + sales) ÷ new customers. Include salaries, tools, ads. Exclude retention spend. The formula is listed in full below. If the number looks off, you can retrace the calculation by hand — that's the point of showing the working.
What the score tells you
Headline financial numbers — income, savings, debt — each tell part of the story. This calculation stitches several together into a single read you can track over time. The value is in the direction, not the absolute number.
What this doesn't capture
The score is a composite of the inputs you provide. Life context — job security, family obligations, health, housing — doesn't appear in the math but shapes the real picture. Use the number as a prompt, not a verdict.
££100,000 marketing + ££50,000 sales ÷ 500 new customers = 300.00.
Inputs
This example uses typical values for illustration. Adjust the inputs above to match a specific situation and see how the result changes.
Sources & Methodology
Methodology
This calculator computes customer acquisition cost by dividing total acquisition spending by the number of new customers gained. Specifically, it adds marketing spend and sales spend, then divides by the count of new customers acquired during the measurement period. The model treats both marketing and sales expenditure as direct acquisition costs and assumes they are wholly attributable to customer acquisition rather than other business functions. It does not account for indirect costs, overhead allocation, retention spending, or the timing of cash flows across the period. Results reflect average cost per customer and do not model differences in customer quality, lifetime value, or the distribution of acquisition costs across different channels or customer segments.
References
Frequently Asked Questions
What's a good CAC?
Include founder time?
Blended CAC vs channel CAC?
How do I lower CAC?
Related Calculators
SaaS LTV:CAC Ratio Calculator
Calculate SaaS LTV-to-CAC ratio from MRR, gross margin, monthly churn, and customer acquisition cost, plus the implied payback months.
SaaS Payback Period Calculator
Calculate months needed to recover CAC from gross margin on ARPU. Enter customer acquisition cost and arpu monthly to see payback months.
More SaaS & Subscription Calculators
SaaS & Subscription
Annual Recurring Revenue Growth Calculator
Calculate your annual recurring revenue growth rate year-over-year and track absolute ARR added — the core SaaS metric investors review first.
SaaS & Subscription
ARPU Calculator
Calculate ARPU by entering total revenue and active user count to see average revenue per user monthly and annualised instantly.
SaaS & Subscription
ARR Calculator
Calculate current ARR and forecast future ARR using your MRR and monthly growth rate over a 12 to 24 month projection horizon.
SaaS & Subscription
ARR Payback Period Calculator
Calculate ARR payback period using total CAC spend, new ARR added, and gross margin to estimate months until acquisition costs are recovered.
SaaS & Subscription
CAC Payback Period Calculator
Calculate CAC payback period in months from customer acquisition cost, MRR per customer, and gross margin on the contract.
SaaS & Subscription
Churn Rate Calculator
Calculate churn rate and net growth rate from starting customers, customers churned, and customers gained during the period.
Explore Other Financial Tools
Financial Health
Income Replacement Calculator
Calculate the capital needed with our income replacement calculator to sustain a target monthly income over time, adjusted for inflation and returns.
Utilities
Supermarket Switcher Calculator
Annual saving from trading a premium supermarket for a discounter — the 20-30% gap applied to your monthly shop across a year.
Marketing & Growth
CRM ROI Calculator
Calculate CRM ROI from annual platform cost, revenue lift percentage, current revenue, and efficiency savings from the workflow improvements.