Advertising
Meta Ads Budget Calculator
Plan Facebook and Instagram spend from CPM through reach, clicks and conversions to profit.
The chain this follows
It works as an Instagram ad cost calculator too: Instagram ads are bought in the same Ads Manager as Facebook ads, and follow the same chain. Budget buys impressions at your CPM. A share of those get clicked at your CTR. A share of the clicks convert at your conversion rate. Each conversion is worth your average order value, of which you keep the gross margin. Ad spend comes out of that margin, not out of revenue.
Every number here is one you can read off Ads Manager for a campaign you have already run. Estimating them for a campaign you have not run is guessing — useful for a sanity check, not for a forecast.
Why profit can be negative at a ROAS above 1
ROAS compares revenue to spend, which ignores the cost of what you sold. A 2x ROAS on a 40% margin returns 80 cents of gross profit for every dollar spent. The break-even line is 1 ÷ margin, and it is shown alongside your actual ROAS so the two can be compared directly.
What it leaves out
Frequency and audience size are not modelled, so a small audience at a large budget will cost more per impression in reality than the CPM you entered. Nor are refunds, repeat purchases or the gap between platform-reported and bank-deposited revenue.