CAC Calculator

What is CAC?

CAC (customer acquisition cost) is the fully-loaded cost of acquiring one new paying customer. It includes ad spend, salaries, sales commissions, martech and agency fees — everything the business paid to bring that customer through the door.

The CAC formula

CAC = (Total Sales + Marketing Spend) ÷ New Customers. Example: $50,000 spent to acquire 400 customers = $125 CAC.

CAC vs CPA

CPA is per conversion inside one campaign. CAC is per customer across every acquisition activity. CAC is always ≥ CPA because it loads in overhead.

LTV:CAC — the growth benchmark

Combine CAC with LTV to get the LTV:CAC ratio.

• Below 1:1 — losing money on every customer.
• 1:1 – 3:1 — sub-scale; improve retention or reduce spend.
• 3:1 — the healthy SaaS benchmark.
• Above 5:1 — likely under-investing in growth.

CAC benchmarks by industry

• B2B SaaS SMB: $200 – $600
• B2B SaaS mid-market: $1,500 – $5,000
• B2B SaaS enterprise: $10,000 – $30,000+
• Ecommerce / DTC: $25 – $150
• Subscription boxes: $40 – $120
• Mobile apps (paid): $5 – $40

How to reduce CAC

1. Grow organic and referral share of new customers.
2. Improve conversion rate across the funnel.
3. Shorten sales cycle with self-serve tiers.
4. Reallocate paid spend to channels with lowest blended CAC.
5. Kill unprofitable segments quickly.