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ROAS calculator: did the ads make money?
Your return on ad spend, read against the break-even ROAS your margins set, so the answer is profit or loss rather than a ratio. Then the target ROAS for the profit you want, the most an order can cost, and which of your campaigns are losing money.
Put in your spend, revenue and margin and press the button. Everything runs in your browser and nothing is stored.
What this leaves out
Credit. The revenue is whatever your ads account claims, and every platform counts the sales it touched, including some that would have happened anyway and some another channel also claims, so the platforms' totals can add up to more revenue than the store took. The calculator can't tell you how much of yours the ads caused: only a test with a holdout group can, and it can come out higher or lower.
Scale, and the rest of the business. It treats ROAS as fixed, but spending more usually buys each extra sale at a lower ROAS. And profit after ads is before rent, salaries and tools, so a campaign can clear break-even here while the company still loses money. For what those fixed costs do to the bank balance, there's the burn rate calculator.
Break-even ROAS, by margin
find your margin,
read across
| Margin before ads | Break-even ROAS | Break-even ACoS | ROAS for 10% profit | ROAS for 20% profit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10% | 10.0× | 10% | None | None |
| 15% | 6.67× | 15% | 20.0× | None |
| 20% | 5.00× | 20% | 10.0× | None |
| 25% | 4.00× | 25% | 6.67× | 20.0× |
| 30% | 3.33× | 30% | 5.00× | 10.0× |
| 35% | 2.86× | 35% | 4.00× | 6.67× |
| 40% | 2.50× | 40% | 3.33× | 5.00× |
| 45% | 2.22× | 45% | 2.86× | 4.00× |
| 50% | 2.00× | 50% | 2.50× | 3.33× |
| 60% | 1.67× | 60% | 2.00× | 2.50× |
| 70% | 1.43× | 70% | 1.67× | 2.00× |
| 80% | 1.25× | 80% | 1.43× | 1.67× |
Margin before ads is what a sale keeps after product cost, shipping, fees and returns. Profit is as a share of revenue, after ad spend. "None" means the margin can't leave that much at any ROAS. The same table, with your own margins and a sheet for every campaign, is in the free ROAS planner spreadsheet.
ROAS benchmarks, read against margin
a median,
not a goal
| Platform, and the data behind it | Median ROAS | Breaks even at a margin of |
|---|---|---|
| Meta (Facebook and Instagram)40,000+ brands, Aug 2025 to Jul 2026. Triple Whale, updated 17 Aug 2026 | 1.88× | 53.2% |
| Google Ads21,000+ brands, Aug 2025 to Jul 2026. Triple Whale, 20 Aug 2026 | 3.27× | 30.6% |
| Amazon AdsBrand count not stated, 2025. Triple Whale, updated 24 Mar 2026 | 3.14× | 31.8% |
Medians for brands that use Triple Whale's software, the only source I found that publishes them with a brand count and a period. It doesn't say which attribution they use, and they vary a lot by industry: on Meta, from 1.13 for media and publishing to 2.35 for sports and outdoors. The middle column is the margin a product needs for that ROAS to break even, so Meta's median of 1.88 loses money for anything that keeps less than about 53% of its price.
How to calculate ROAS
Divide the revenue your ads brought in by what they cost. $16,000 of revenue from $5,000 of ad spend is a ROAS of 3.2, written 3.2×, 3.2:1 or 320%. Every dollar of ads brought back $3.20 of revenue.
Revenue, not profit, which is the catch. A ROAS says how much the ads sold, not whether selling it made money. That depends on what each sale costs you, which is what break-even ROAS measures.
Break-even ROAS
Break-even ROAS is one divided by your margin before ads: the share of each sale left after product cost, shipping, payment fees and returns. Keep 50% of a sale and you break even at 2×; keep 25% and you need 4×. Below it, every sale the ads bring loses money.
Take the example store in the calculator. Product cost is 35% of price, shipping 8%, fees 3%, returns 6%, and $2 an order for packaging, so each sale keeps 45.5% of its revenue. Its break-even ROAS is 1 ÷ 0.455, or 2.20×. Its ads return 3.2×, so they cleared break-even and left $2,280 of profit after their own cost.
Target ROAS for a profit goal
Break-even is the floor. To keep a share of revenue as profit after ads, take that share off your margin before dividing: target ROAS is 1 ÷ (margin − profit wanted). The example store keeps 45.5% before ads; to keep 10% of revenue after them, it needs 1 ÷ 0.355, or 2.82×.
If the profit you want is more than your margin, no ROAS gets there. That's a pricing or cost problem, and no amount of bidding fixes it.
Setting target ROAS in Google Ads, and a ROAS goal in Meta
The two platforms write the same number differently. Google Ads takes target ROAS as a percentage: its help pages give $5 of sales for $1 of spend as 500%. Meta takes a ROAS goal as a decimal: its example is a goal of 1.100 for $110 back on $100. So the example store's 2.82× is 282% in Google Ads and 2.82 in Meta. A Meta goal of 1.00 means revenue equals spend, which isn't break-even once the product has costs.
Both need conversion values to bid on. Google asks for at least 15 conversions in the past 30 days for target ROAS on Search and Shopping, suggests starting from the conversion value over cost you've been getting, and warns that a target set too high limits traffic. Meta says its ROAS goal works best with 50 to 100 or more conversions a week, can spend less than the budget when it can't find sales at the goal, and suggests starting 10 to 20% below your average ROAS. The calculator's target is what your margins need, not what the auction will give you on day one: if it's well above what you get now, move towards it in steps.
The ROAS in your ads account isn't the whole story
Every platform reports the sales it can connect to its ads, which isn't the same as the sales its ads caused. When researchers compared randomised experiments with the usual ways of measuring ads, the gaps were large. In 15 experiments at Facebook, published in Marketing Science in 2019, the non-experimental methods were off by a factor of three in half of them. When eBay switched off its ads on its own brand name, about 99.5% of those clicks came back through the free results anyway.
The gap doesn't only run one way: tests sometimes find ads doing more than the platform credits. The way to know is a lift test, which shows ads to one randomised group and holds them back from another. Meta and Google both offer one, and Meta says not to compare its results with the numbers in Ads Manager. Until you've run one, read a platform's ROAS as an upper estimate for retargeting and brand search, and check the total against MER, the store's own revenue over total marketing spend.
ROAS, ROI, POAS, ACoS and MER
ROAS is revenue over ad spend. ROI is profit over the whole investment, so it can't be read from ad numbers alone. POAS, profit on ad spend, divides what the sales leave before ads by the ad spend, so 1 is break-even whatever the margin. ACoS, advertising cost of sales, is Amazon's measure and the same thing upside down: ad spend over revenue, so a ROAS of 4× is an ACoS of 25%, and break-even ACoS equals your margin.
MER, the marketing efficiency ratio, is all revenue over all marketing spend, from the store's own numbers rather than any ad platform's. It's sometimes called blended ROAS. Because it doesn't depend on which platform claims which sale, it's the check on the others.
A blended ROAS can hide a losing campaign
The example store's 3.2× is three campaigns. Brand search returns 8×, retargeting 2.75× and prospecting 2×. Prospecting is under the 2.20× break-even and loses $234 on its own, inside an account that's making money overall. The campaign table in the calculator reads each one against the same break-even, so this shows up.
That doesn't make prospecting the one to cut. Brand search and retargeting mostly reach people who already know the store, often because prospecting found them. A campaign's own ROAS is the start of the question, not the answer.
Questions people actually ask
answered properly,
not padded out
What is ROAS?
Return on ad spend: the revenue your ads brought in for each unit of currency spent on them. $16,000 of revenue from $5,000 of ads is a ROAS of 3.2, or 320%.
How do you calculate ROAS?
Divide the revenue from the ads by the ad spend. Revenue of $16,000 over spend of $5,000 is 3.2. Use the same period and the same campaigns for both, and the revenue your ads account attributes to them.
What is break-even ROAS?
The ROAS at which the ads exactly pay for themselves: one divided by your margin before ads. If each sale keeps 40% of its price after product cost, shipping, fees and returns, break-even ROAS is 1 ÷ 0.4 = 2.5. Any lower and the ads lose money.
What is a good ROAS?
One comfortably above your break-even ROAS, which depends on your margin, so there's no single number. 3× is a loss for a product that keeps 25% of its price (break-even 4×) and very profitable for one that keeps 70% (break-even 1.43×). For context, Triple Whale's published medians are 1.88 on Meta, 3.27 on Google Ads and 3.14 on Amazon. Work out your break-even first, then aim above it.
What is the average ROAS?
Triple Whale, which publishes medians from brands using its software, gives a median of 1.88 on Meta (over 40,000 brands, August 2025 to July 2026), 3.27 on Google Ads (over 21,000 brands, same period) and 3.14 on Amazon (2025). It doesn't say which attribution those use. The often-quoted 'average ROAS of 2.87' has no source I could trace. A median isn't a goal: your break-even ROAS is.
What is a good ROAS for Facebook ads?
One above your break-even ROAS. For context, Triple Whale's median for Meta across more than 40,000 brands was 1.88 from August 2025 to July 2026, which only breaks even for a product that keeps about 53% of its price. By industry its medians ran from 1.13 for media and publishing to 2.35 for sports and outdoors.
What target ROAS should I set in Google Ads?
Google suggests starting from the conversion value over cost you've been getting, and entering it as a percentage: 500% is $5 back for each $1. Your break-even and target ROAS from this calculator tell you whether that's profitable. If your target is well above your current ROAS, raise it in steps, because Google warns a target set too high limits traffic.
How do I enter a ROAS goal in Meta?
As a decimal, not a percentage: 2.5 for $2.50 back on each $1. Meta accepts 0.001 to 1000, and its ROAS goal needs value optimisation and a working Pixel or SDK. A goal of 1.00 only means revenue equals spend, which is a loss once the product costs anything.
Is a ROAS of 2 good?
Only if your margin before ads is over 50%. A ROAS of 2 means each unit of ad spend brought two of revenue, so the sales have to keep more than half their revenue for the ads to make money.
What does a 4:1 ROAS mean?
Four of revenue for every one spent on ads: $4,000 from $1,000, or 400%. It's often called a good ROAS, but there's no source for 4:1 as a standard: it's simply break-even for a product that keeps 25% of its price, so it's profitable only above that margin.
What's the difference between ROAS and ROI?
ROAS divides revenue by ad spend. ROI divides profit by the total investment. A campaign can have a ROAS of 3 and still lose money if each sale keeps less than a third of its revenue, which ROI would show and ROAS doesn't.
How do ROAS and ACoS relate?
ACoS is one over ROAS, as a percentage: a ROAS of 4 is an ACoS of 25%, and an ACoS of 20% is a ROAS of 5. Break-even ACoS is your margin before ads.
What is POAS?
Profit on ad spend: the gross profit the ads' sales bring, after product cost, shipping, payment fees and packaging, divided by the ad spend. A POAS of 1 is break-even, so it reads the same for every product, which ROAS doesn't.
Should ROAS include tax and shipping?
Your break-even ROAS has to be on the same basis as the revenue you measure. If your ads account counts revenue with VAT or GST in it, the margin has to be worked on the revenue after tax, or the ROAS looks better than it is. The calculator has a field for the tax rate in the revenue and adjusts for it.
Is my data stored or sent anywhere?
No. Everything runs in your browser, and nothing is sent or saved. The campaign table's CSV is made on your device.