ROI Calculator (Return on Investment)
Profit divided by cost — plus the piece ROI usually hides: time. Add the years and the annualized return appears beside it, so a slow 50% stops impersonating a fast one.
A percentage with a missing dimension
ROI — profit divided by cost — is the most quoted and least complete number in investing. It contains no clock: a 50% ROI earned in eighteen months and one earned across a decade print identically. This page restores the missing dimension with an annualized figure whenever you supply the years.
ROI = (final − cost) ÷ cost · Annualized = (final ÷ cost)1/years − 1
Example: $10,000 became $15,000: ROI +50%, money multiple 1.5×. Over 5 years that is an 8.45% annualized return; over 15 years, just 2.74%. Same ROI, three different investments wearing its coat — the annualized line is the one to compare.
Costs: the silent input
ROI is only as honest as the 'cost' you admit: purchase commissions, carrying costs, your own renovation weekends. The stock-profit calculator on this site enforces one version of that honesty (fees on both sides); here the discipline is yours.
How this is calculated
ROI = (final − cost) ÷ cost × 100. Annualized return is the CAGR of the two endpoints over the entered years (see the CAGR calculator for the concept). Negative outcomes are handled symmetrically — a final value below cost yields a negative ROI and, with years, the equivalent yearly rate of decline.
Frequently asked questions
Can ROI exceed 100%?
Yes — any time the profit exceeds the stake. Leveraged and early-stage outcomes post ROIs in the hundreds or thousands of percent; the number has no ceiling, unlike margin or yield measures.
What is a 'good' ROI?
Only relative to time and risk: 8% annualized from a dull index fund is a fine outcome; 8% annualized from a concentrated, illiquid speculation is compensation badly mismatched to its risk. Context is the metric.
ROI vs ROE vs ROA?
ROI judges a specific investment's in/out. ROE measures a company's profit against shareholders' equity; ROA against all its assets. Same family, different denominators — the business pages here keep to ROI and margins.
Should my time count as a cost?
For decisions, yes — an investment that returns 30% but consumed 200 hours of your management may pay you less per hour than your job. Most spreadsheets omit it; your life does not.
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