AI ROI calculator: what manual work costs your team.
This AI ROI calculator turns three numbers into what manual work costs your team this year, and what a conservative 30% recovery is worth.
Your numbers
How this is calculated
- Weekly burn = team size x hours per week on automatable tasks x blended hourly cost.
- Annual burn = weekly burn x 52.
- Monthly recovery assumes you recover 30% of that time in the first year. That is a conservative floor, not a promise. Most teams we work with find more once the first workflow ships.
The math runs in your browser. We only take your email if you ask us to send the report, and we use it for that.
The same math we run inside client teams
What lands in your inbox
The on-screen number is free and ungated. Ask for the report and you also get:
- The full calculation with your inputs written out, so it survives a budget meeting.
- What the burn looks like in hours and working days, not just dollars.
- What another quarter of waiting costs at the conservative recovery rate.
- The three-step way to pick your first workflow, in order.
How this AI ROI calculator works
Three inputs. Team size, average hourly cost, and the hours per week your team spends on manual work AI could handle: reporting, data entry, first drafts, routing, summarizing. You get back your annual hidden burn, what a conservative first-year recovery is worth, and what every month of waiting costs you. Call it an automation ROI calculator if you like; the math is the same.
Why we assume 30% recovery, not 80%
Vendor ROI calculators assume best-case automation rates because heroic numbers sell software. We assume 30% first-year recovery. That's the conservative end of what we see when adoption is run properly, and it's still more than most teams capture when it isn't. Here's the test that matters: if the conservative number clears your budget bar, the project is real.
Enterprise AI ROI calculator vs a vendor's
Most enterprise AI ROI calculators assume vendor-demo recovery rates; this one assumes 30%, because that is the number you have to defend in a budget meeting. Same three inputs, same math, whether you run a 40-person team or a 400-person one.
What the number is and is not
It's a sizing tool. Is the prize big enough to bother? That's the question it answers, and the only one. It's not a proposal, not a guarantee, and no substitute for looking at your actual workflows. Two companies can type in identical numbers and have wildly different recoverable hours, depending on process maturity. That difference is exactly what the AI readiness assessment measures next.
FAQ
What is an AI ROI calculator?
A tool that estimates what you'd get back from using AI on manual work, based on team size, labor cost, and hours spent. Ours runs a conservative 30% first-year recovery assumption, on purpose.
What counts as "work AI could handle"?
The repetitive, rules-light stuff: reporting, data entry, first drafts, routing, summarizing, status chasing. Not judgment calls, not relationships, not novel problems.
Is my data saved?
The math runs in your browser and your numbers aren't stored. If you ask us to email the breakdown, we use that address to send it. You're not subscribed to anything.
Why is the result lower than other calculators?
Because we assume 30% recovery instead of vendor-demo rates. You want a number you can defend in a budget meeting, not one that impresses on a landing page.
What do I do with the result?
If the annual number clears your budget bar, take the AI readiness assessment next. Bring both to a Shadow Day and we'll turn them into a ranked plan.