Big Rig Daily · Free Driver Tools

Owner-Operator Profit Calculator

Enter a load and your truck costs to see what you keep per load, per mile and per week after fuel, maintenance, tolls, payments and insurance. Everything runs in your browser and nothing you type is sent anywhere.

Planning estimate only. This calculator is a planning estimate only, not tax or financial advice. It shows money left after the costs you enter, before income tax and self-employment tax. Check real numbers against your settlements and talk to a tax professional or accountant about your situation.

How the owner-operator profit calculator works

The calculator follows the money for one load, then for a week and a year. Here are the steps, so you can also check them by hand.

• Total miles are loaded miles plus deadhead miles. Fuel and maintenance are charged on every mile the truck rolls, loaded or empty.
• Fuel is total miles divided by your MPG, times the price per gallon.
• Maintenance and tires are total miles times your cost per mile.
• Tolls are what you enter for the load.
• Fixed costs (insurance, truck payment, trailer payment and other monthly bills) are added up per month, turned into a weekly cost by multiplying by 12 and dividing by 52, then split evenly across your loads per week.
• Take-home per load is the load rate minus all of those costs. Dividing by total miles and by loaded miles gives take-home per mile both ways.
• Take-home per week is the weekly revenue minus the weekly running costs and the weekly share of fixed costs.
• Take-home per year is the profit before fixed costs on every load you run in the weeks you work, minus 12 full months of fixed costs.

Each cost line is rounded to the cent and the totals are sums of the rounded lines, so the breakdown adds up on screen.

A worked example

These are round example numbers to show the math, not typical costs. A load pays $2,000 for 800 loaded miles with 100 deadhead miles and $40 in tolls. Diesel is $4.00 a gallon, the truck gets 6.5 MPG and maintenance runs 20 cents a mile. Monthly bills are $1,000 insurance, $2,000 truck payment, $500 trailer payment and $300 other, for $3,800 a month. The driver runs 3 loads a week and works 48 weeks a year.

• Total miles: 800 + 100 = 900.
• Fuel: 900 / 6.5 = 138.46 gallons, times $4.00 = $553.85.
• Maintenance: 900 x $0.20 = $180.00.
• Fixed costs per week: $3,800 x 12 / 52 = $876.92, or $292.31 per load across 3 loads.
• Total cost per load: $553.85 + $180.00 + $40.00 + $292.31 = $1,066.16.
• Take-home per load: $2,000 - $1,066.16 = $933.84, which is about $1.04 per total mile or $1.17 per loaded mile.
• Take-home per week: $6,000 revenue - $3,198.47 in costs = $2,801.53.
• Take-home per year: ($2,000 - $773.85 running cost) x 3 loads x 48 weeks = $176,565.60, minus $45,600 in fixed costs for 12 months = $130,965.60.

The yearly figure is lower than 48 times the weekly figure because the truck payment and insurance are still due during the 4 weeks off.

Tips for a more accurate estimate

• Use your real MPG from fuel receipts and your odometer or ELD miles, not the number on the window sticker.
• Look up the current diesel price in your region on the EIA Gasoline and Diesel Fuel Update, which the U.S. Energy Information Administration updates weekly, or use what you actually paid.
• For maintenance per mile, add up a year of repair, tire and service bills and divide by the miles you drove that year.
• Count every monthly bill that keeps coming whether you run or not: plates, permits, ELD and app subscriptions, phone, parking and loan payments.
• If you pay a dispatcher or a percentage to a carrier you are leased to, take that off the load rate before you type it in.

The all-in cost per total mile in the results is the number to use when you size up the next load. Type it into the load rate checker to see the profit, true rate per mile with deadhead and break-even rate for a single load before you book it.

If you are deciding whether to buy a truck at all, the owner-operator vs company driver guide walks through costs, pay and paperwork on each path. The trucker per diem guide explains a tax topic that affects what you keep, and the truck driver pay by state guide shows what company drivers earn for comparison.

To track real numbers load by load, print the free weekly trip log. It has space for miles, fuel, tolls and other expenses so you can compare each week to this estimate.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I calculate owner-operator profit on a load?

Start with the load rate. Subtract fuel (total miles divided by MPG, times the diesel price), maintenance per mile times total miles, tolls, and the load's share of your fixed monthly costs. What is left is your take-home on that load before income and self-employment taxes.

Should I count deadhead miles?

Yes. Your truck burns fuel and wears tires on empty miles too, so the calculator charges fuel and maintenance on loaded plus deadhead miles. It also shows take-home per loaded mile and per total mile, so you can see how much the empty miles cost you.

How are monthly costs turned into weekly costs?

A year has 52 weeks and 12 months, so a month averages 52 / 12 weeks. The calculator multiplies each monthly cost by 12 and divides by 52. For example, a $1,300 monthly bill is $1,300 x 12 / 52 = $300 a week.

What does it cost to run a truck per mile?

It depends on your truck, freight, lanes and fuel prices, so your own bills are the best guide. For a benchmark, the American Transportation Research Institute said in its 2026 Analysis of the Operational Costs of Trucking release that the industry average cost to operate a truck in 2025 was $2.336 per mile, or $1.854 per mile without fuel. Those are averages from fleet data and include driver pay, so a one-truck owner-operator's numbers can look different.

Does take-home include taxes?

No. The result is money left after the truck costs you enter, before federal and state income tax and self-employment tax. The IRS explains self-employment tax for people who work for themselves. Ask a tax professional what to set aside.