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Burn Rate calculator

Enter the cash balance at the start of the period, the balance at the end, and the number of months between them. The calculator works out the average Burn Rate — how much cash the company spends per month.

Result

Burn Rate (per month)

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This calculation is for informational purposes only and does not replace advice from a qualified professional. Formulas and rates may not fit your exact situation — double-check the figures before making decisions.

How it is calculated

Burn Rate = (balance at period start − balance at period end) ÷ number of months. This is net burn — it accounts for all inflows and outflows over the period, not just spending: if the company already earns revenue, that partly offsets spending, so net burn is lower than gross spend.

Burn Rate computed this way averages spend over the whole period — if spending varied a lot month to month (say, a large one-off payment), the actual burn in individual months can differ noticeably from the average.

Burn Rate is a direct input for computing Runway (cash balance ÷ burn rate = how many months the company can survive at this pace): the value computed here can be plugged straight into the separate Runway calculator.

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