Use this ROI calculator to see your net profit, ROI percent, and ROI multiple from what you put in versus what you got back, with optional fees. Switch to Annualized ROI to compare investments held for different lengths of time.
Advanced options
How to use our ROI Calculator
- Pick a Calculation mode: Simple ROI (no time) or Annualized ROI (adds a per-year rate).
- Enter your Initial investment (USD), which is the money you paid at the start.
- Enter your Final value or money received (USD), which is what you got back (or what it is worth now).
- Open Advanced options and enter Fees and other costs (USD) if you paid any extra costs.
- If you chose Annualized ROI, enter a Holding period value and choose Years or Months.
- If you chose Annualized ROI, pick an Annualized method: CAGR (compound) for the standard comparison, or Simple average for a quick per-year average.
- Click Calculate.
- Read Net profit (USD) to see your gain or loss, then check ROI (percent) and ROI multiple (x) for comparison.
- If Annualized ROI shows N/A, read Notes to see what input made compound annualization invalid.
Definitions
Initial investment (USD): The money you put in at the start.
Final value (USD): The money you got back at the end (or the current value if you still hold it).
Fees and other costs (USD): Extra costs you paid (for example fees or repairs). These count as part of what you paid.
Total cost basis (USD): Initial investment plus fees and other costs. This is the main amount ROI is compared to. [1]
Net profit (USD): Final value minus initial investment minus fees. Positive is profit; negative is a loss.
ROI (percent): Profit compared to total cost basis, shown as a percent. [1]
ROI multiple (x): Final value divided by total cost basis (example: 1.25x).
Annualized ROI (percent per year): A per-year return estimate so you can compare different time lengths more fairly. [2]
CAGR (compound): A compound annual growth rate based on the ratio (final value divided by total cost basis). [2]
Methodology
What this calculator counts as cost
This calculator treats fees and other costs as part of what you paid (your total cost basis). This matches the idea that ROI compares your net gain to your total amount invested. [1]
Step 1: Clean and validate inputs
We remove commas and spaces before parsing numbers.
If Initial investment or Final value is blank or not a number, that is an error.
Fees and other costs is optional. Blank means 0, but non-blank invalid text is an error.
If Total cost basis equals 0, ROI and ROI multiple are undefined, so the calculator shows an error and stops.
Step 2: Core totals (always computed)
net_profit = final_value - initial_investment - fees_costs
total_cost_basis = initial_investment + fees_costs
roi_percent = (net_profit / total_cost_basis) * 100
roi_multiple = final_value / total_cost_basis
Step 3: Holding period conversion (Annualized mode only)
Holding period must be greater than 0.
years = holding_period_value (unit=years) or holding_period_value/12 (unit=months)
Step 4: Annualized ROI (Annualized mode only)
If you pick CAGR (compound), we use the standard compound annual growth idea to compare different time lengths. [2]
annualized_roi = ((final_value/total_cost_basis)^(1/years) - 1) * 100
If (final_value / total_cost_basis) is negative, the compound formula can produce a non-real number for typical holding periods, so Annualized ROI is shown as N/A and explained in Notes. If final_value is 0 and total_cost_basis is positive, the CAGR result is -100% per year (valid).
If you pick Simple average, we divide the total ROI percent by years (this is not a compounding rate). [3]
annualized_roi_simple = roi_percent / years
Rounding and display
Money outputs are formatted in USD with comma separators and 2 decimals (avoids scientific notation). Percent outputs are shown with 2 decimals. Very small technical rates are still shown as normal numbers, not scientific notation.