A free freelance rate calculator that works out your hourly, day and project rates from what you want to take home, your tax, your costs and the hours a client pays for.
Enter what you want to take home and how you work. You'll get the hourly, day and week rates that pay for it, a project price, and a rate card to copy or save.
What you want to take home
Take-home is what you keep after tax and costs. For tax, put in the share of your profit you set aside where you live.
How you work
Sales calls, proposals, email, invoices and learning are work nobody pays for. Track a normal week to find your share.
Your rates
Enter what you want to take home to see your rates.
This free freelance rate calculator works out what to charge an hour, a day and a project, starting from what you want to take home.
Enter your take-home pay, the tax you set aside, your costs and how you work. See the rates that pay for it, price a project, check the rate you charge now, and save a rate card.
Here's how freelance rates work, why the hours matter more than most people think, and how to raise yours.
What is a freelance rate calculator?
A freelance rate calculator turns the money you want to take home into the rate you need to charge.
It works backward: from your take-home pay, through tax and costs, to the revenue you need. Then it divides that revenue by the hours a client really pays for.
Who is the freelance rate calculator for?
It's for anyone who sells their time and wants a rate that pays for their life:
- How to make money online – new freelancers setting a first rate and picking what to sell.
- How to make money with AI – freelancers selling AI services who need a price for new work.
- Money model generator – consultants and coaches turning hours into offers.
- Currency converter – freelancers who quote in a client's currency.
- Podcast sponsorship calculator – creators pricing sponsorships instead of hours.
The calculator runs in your browser, and your numbers stay on your device.
How to use the freelance rate calculator
How the math works
Your rate is the revenue you need, divided by your billable hours:
- Revenue – your take-home pay grossed up for tax, plus your costs, plus your buffer.
- Billable hours – hours a week, times the share a client pays for, times your working weeks.
Here's the example the calculator loads under Try an example:
| Step | Example |
|---|---|
| Take-home pay | $80,000 |
| Tax set aside (25% of profit) | $26,667 |
| Business costs ($300 a month) | $3,600 |
| Buffer for slow months (10%) | $11,027 |
| Revenue you need | $121,294 |
| Billable hours (40 × 70% × 46 weeks) | 1,288 |
| Hourly rate | $95 |
| Day rate (8 hours) | $760 |
| Week rate (5 days) | $3,800 |
A 20-hour project at that rate, with 10% padding, comes to $2,090. And if you charge $60 an hour today, you take home about $49,991 a year, so you'd need to raise your rate by 58%.
Why billable hours matter most
The number most freelancers get wrong isn't the rate. It's the hours.
A 40-hour week isn't 40 billable hours. Finding clients, writing proposals, sending invoices, answering email and learning new tools all take time, and no client pays for it.
At 70% billable, a 40-hour week gives you 28 hours to sell. Take 6 weeks off for vacation, public holidays and sick days, and a year holds 1,288 billable hours, not the 2,080 of 40 hours times 52 weeks.
Divide the same revenue by 2,080 hours instead of 1,288, and you'd charge about 38% less than you need.
Hourly, day or project pricing?
- Best for
- Open-ended work, support, small changes
- Watch out for
- You earn less as you get faster
- Best for
- Workshops, on-site work, full days of focus
- Watch out for
- Clients expect a full day, so protect it
- Best for
- Work with a clear scope and a clear result
- Watch out for
- Scope creep: add padding and write down what's included
- Best for
- Ongoing work for one client every month
- Watch out for
- Set the hours it covers and what happens past them
Start from your hourly rate either way. A project price is your hours times your rate, plus padding for the work nobody scoped.
How to raise your rate
- Raise it for new clients first, then for the clients you have, with notice.
- Price the result, not the hours: work that makes a client money is worth more than your time.
- Package your service as a fixed offer at a fixed price. The grand slam offer generator builds one.
- Check what your offer is worth to a buyer with the value equation calculator.
- Add recurring work, like a retainer or a membership, to smooth out slow months. More in my guide to a recurring revenue business.
No one is going to value you more than you value you. Set a high personal hourly rate, and stick to it.
$100M Offers
by Alex Hormozi
Proven strategies for creating irresistible offers that customers can't say no to. Covers pricing, value stacking, and positioning to maximize conversions.
I may earn a commission if you make a purchase, at no additional cost to you.
Freelancing from anywhere
Freelancing works from anywhere, and a few of my free tools help when you do:
- Digital nomad visa finder – most nomad visas ask for a monthly income, and your rate decides whether you reach it.
- Tax rates by country – the share to set aside depends on where you're tax resident.
- Money transfer comparison – get paid by clients abroad for less.
- Business bank account finder – keep client money apart from your own.
- Time zone overlap calculator – find the hours you share with a client far away.
I wrote more about living and working this way in what is a global citizen.
Freelance Rate Calculator FAQs
Questions about the freelance rate calculator? Here's what to know.
A freelance rate calculator works out what to charge from what you want to take home.
It adds your tax and costs to your take-home pay, then divides by the hours a client pays for.
Add the tax you set aside, your business costs and a buffer to your take-home pay.
Then divide that revenue by your billable hours a year: hours a week, times the share clients pay for, times your working weeks.
Start from what you need to live on, not from what others charge.
The calculator gives you the lowest rate that pays for your life, and you can charge more once you have results to show.
Billable hours are the hours a client pays for.
Finding clients, writing proposals, sending invoices and learning aren't billable, so most freelancers bill fewer hours than they work.
Multiply your hourly rate by the hours in your working day.
The calculator takes your hours a week divided by your days a week.
Estimate the hours, multiply them by your hourly rate and add padding for the work nobody scoped.
The calculator does this under Price a project, with 10%, 20% or 30% padding.
It depends on where you're tax resident and how much you earn.
My tax rates by country tool shows each country's rates from its own tax office, and an accountant can tell you your share.
Yes, pick any currency and every amount shows in it, written the way your browser writes numbers.
Your numbers are saved in your browser, so they're there when you come back.
Nothing you enter is sent to navid.me.
I did. I'm Navid Moazzez, and I made the freelance rate calculator as one of my free tools on navid.me.
More about me.
Navid Moazzez
AI business strategist & AI OS builder
Navid Moazzez helps creators and founders master AI and build their own AI Operating System (AI OS) to automate their business and life.
Navid.me is reader-supported. When you buy through links on this site, I may earn an affiliate commission. Learn more.
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