Work out the monthly net sales you need to cover listed fixed costs, after the costs that move with sales. We show dine-in seat turns from the dine-in share only, and we keep a cash view separate from the accounting view.
Planning estimate. Check classifications with your accountant.
Running costs and break-even calculator
Enter a typical month. See the net sales you need, dine-in seat turns from the dine-in share only, and a cash view beside the accounting view.
The starting figures are example monthly numbers for a roughly 40-seat casual restaurant, in US dollars, so you can see how the calculator works. They are not an estimate for your city and not an industry average. Replace every figure with your own. Currency symbols do not convert amounts. Nothing you type leaves your browser. Planning estimate. Check classifications with your accountant.
How this works
Choose a currency and enter a typical month. Fixed costs are the bills that arrive whether you are busy or not. Variable costs move with sales: food and drink, payment fees, and delivery commission on the delivery share only.
Contribution margin is weighted by channel: for each channel we take its share of net sales times (1 minus that channel’s variable-cost ratio). Break-even net sales equal listed accounting fixed costs divided by that margin, when the margin is positive.
If 20 percent of net sales go through an app that charges 30 percent, that is 6 percent of all net sales, not 30 percent of all net sales. If a platform charges on tax-inclusive sales, switch the fee base and enter the tax rate so we can convert the fee to an effective cost of net sales.
Dine-in seat turns use only the dine-in share of sales, spend per cover, opening days and seats. Delivery and takeaway use their own average order values and are never turned into covers or seat turns.
Loan principal and owner drawings are cash items. Interest and owner salary are accounting expenses. We show both a cash view and an accounting view, and we do not call the remainder profit, because this is not a complete accounting result.
Assumptions
- All ratios use net sales excluding VAT or sales tax. We do not infer VAT registration or tax-recovery rights from the country you are in.
- Channel mix is assumed constant when we scale to break-even.
- Recoverable input tax is excluded from costs; irrecoverable tax should be included in the cost you enter.
- Currency symbols change the label only. They do not convert figures or change the formulas.
- Working-capital movements, capital spending, depreciation and tax cash flows are not modelled.
- A loan payment is split into principal (cash only) and interest (an accounting expense).
- A local accountant should check how your loan, salary and drawings should be classified.
What does each line mean, and what do people forget?
I have cooked in kitchens and later been responsible for a room and a team. The running-cost mistakes I still see are usually the same ones: a break-even that ignores the owner’s own pay, a food-cost percentage copied from a blog rather than from last month’s stock count, and a delivery plan that forgets that commission only applies to app sales — but still changes the maths a lot.
Rent, wages, on-costs and owner pay
Rent is obvious. Labour is where budgets go soft. Count the wages you actually pay, then add employer on-costs: social security, insurance, benefits, staff meals, bonuses, whatever your country requires. The calculator does that multiplication for you. Then put in owner pay. If you have to live, that money has to come from the business. Leaving yourself out does not make the restaurant more profitable. It just hides the true break-even.
Food, drink, card fees and delivery
Food and drink cost should be a percentage of sales before VAT and service charge, from a real stock count, not a target you wish were true. Card and payment fees are usually a percentage of card sales; if almost every guest pays by card, treat the rate as a percentage of all sales. Delivery commission is different. It is charged on the orders that go through the app. The calculator asks for the commission rate and the share of sales that comes from delivery, then combines them. If you want a line-by-line view of GrabFood and LINE MAN in Thailand, see the delivery-cost guide in the related links.
Utilities, insurance, software, marketing, repairs, loans and other
Treat these as fixed for a first pass, even though some of them move a little with volume. Utilities on a hot line will rise in a busy month, and repairs are lumpy, but if you pretend they are zero the break-even is fiction. Software subscriptions are easy to forget because they are small and automatic. Marketing has to be in the number if you plan to spend it. Loan repayments are not optional just because they are not “operating costs” in a textbook.
Average spend, seats and opening days
Average spend per guest is total sales divided by covers, not the price of your most popular main. Seats are the seats you can actually sell, not the number on an old plan. Opening days should be the days you really open in a month, including the quiet ones. From those three figures the calculator can translate a sales target into covers per month, covers per day, and the seat turns you need. A turn is one full use of the seat in a day. Needing two turns on a Tuesday in a neighbourhood that only fills on Friday is a plan, not a fact — and you need to see that before you sign a lease or hire a larger team.
How should you read the result?
If variable costs are 100 percent or more of sales, there is no break-even. You lose money on every extra guest until food cost, fees or delivery mix change. If there is a break-even, compare it with the sales you honestly expect, not the sales you would need in a perfect month. The profit-or-loss line is there for that test.
Then look at the covers and the turns. The sales figure only becomes real when you can see the number of people who have to walk in, sit down and spend that average ticket, on the days you are actually open, in the seats you actually have.
Frequently asked questions
What is break-even for a restaurant?
It is the monthly sales you need so that, after variable costs, the money left over covers your fixed costs. Below that sales figure you lose money; above it you start to make some.
How do you calculate restaurant break-even?
Divide fixed costs by (1 minus the variable cost percentage). Variable costs include food and drink, card and payment fees, and delivery commission on the share of sales that goes through apps.
Should I include my own pay in the calculator?
Yes, if you need to live on the business. Leaving owner pay out makes break-even look easier than it is.
How do delivery apps change break-even?
Commission applies only to the share of sales that goes through the apps, but that still raises your variable cost percentage and the sales you need. The calculator combines the commission rate and the delivery share into an effective percentage of total sales.
Is break-even the same as a profit target?
No. Break-even is the point where you cover costs. The profit-or-loss line lets you test an expected sales figure above or below that point.
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