Meeting Cost Calculator
| Meeting | People | 30 minutes costs | Hourly cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Daily standup ($100k avg) | 6 | $144.23 | $288.46 |
| Team sync ($100k avg) | 8 | $192.31 | $384.62 |
| Leadership weekly ($180k avg) | 5 | $216.35 | $432.69 |
| All-hands ($90k avg) | 40 | $865.38 | $1,730.77 |
Every meeting has a meter running; this tool just makes it visible. Enter the headcount and the average salary in the room, press start when the meeting starts, and watch the dollars tick live - a six-person room of $100k salaries burns 8 cents per second, $288.46 an hour, and crosses $100 before the intro slide is done.
Bottom line: the meter is not an audit - it is a meeting-hygiene instrument. Teams that can see the burn end meetings on time, invite fewer spectators, and discover that the daily standup costs $28.85 per half hour, which reframes every 'quick sync' that could have been a message.
The honest part: the arithmetic uses salary divided by 2,080 working hours - it ignores benefits and overhead, which in most companies load true cost to 1.25-1.4x salary. So the live number is the floor, not the ceiling; the meeting is actually more expensive than the meter says.
How to use
- Set the headcount and the average salary in the room (be honest about the seniority mix - the default assumes all-$100k, which flatters most real meetings).
- Press start when the meeting starts and let it run - the live counter is the tool; the per-minute and per-hour stats are for the retrospective.
- Use the weekly figure in the stats to price recurring meetings: the weekly cost times 52 is what the standing meeting actually costs the year.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a one-hour meeting with 8 people cost?
At a $100k average salary: $384.62 an hour for the room - the meter shows it live. The standard arithmetic is salary divided by 2,080 working hours per year, multiplied by headcount; loaded costs (benefits, overhead) push the true figure to roughly 1.25-1.4x that, so $385 is the floor price of everyone's hour.
What is the average cost of a meeting?
The table above prices the classics: a daily standup of six $100k people costs $28.85 per half hour ($7,500 a year if it truly runs daily), while a 40-person all-hands burns $288 in a half hour - $5,769 an hour. Any recurring meeting's annual cost is simply its hourly cost times 52; the recurring ones are where the real money lives.
Does this include benefits and overhead?
No - deliberately. Salary divided by 2,080 is the clean, defensible floor that everyone can verify; loaded cost (benefits, payroll tax, office or software overhead) typically runs 1.25-1.4x salary depending on the company. If you want the loaded number, multiply the meter's reading by 1.3 and enjoy the extra honesty.
Is a meeting ever worth the cost?
Yes - decisions that need real-time debate, trust-building, and anything with a hard interpersonal edge are exactly what meetings are for. The meter is aimed at the other kind: the status meeting that could be a document, the invite list with spectators, the weekly that survived its project. The test the meter forces: if the room would not spend this money from petty cash on what the meeting produces, cancel or cut the invite list.