CPA Calculator
Cost per acquisition is your spend divided by the number of conversions — leads, bookings or sales, whichever you count. Enter your figures below.
Your numbers
Result
Fill in the fields to see your result.
Formula
CPA = Total spend ÷ Conversions
Worked example
Spend $1,000 for 40 leads and your cost per lead is $25. If one in four leads closes, each customer costs $100 to acquire.
What's a good number?
A good CPA is any CPA below what a customer is worth to you — which is why the close rate field matters more than the headline number. A $25 lead is excellent for a roofer whose average job is $9,000 and terrible for a business selling a $30 product. Work backwards: take your average customer value, multiply by the margin you keep, and that is the absolute ceiling. Most healthy businesses want acquisition cost at a third of that or less.
Questions
- What's the difference between CPA and CPL?
- Cost per lead counts anyone who raises their hand. Cost per acquisition usually counts a completed action further down the funnel — a sale, a booking, a signup. Whichever you use, be consistent, because mixing them makes campaigns look better or worse than they are.
- My cost per lead is rising. Why?
- The common causes are audience fatigue (the same people have seen the ad too many times), creative decay, increased auction competition, or a change that widened targeting. Check frequency first — it is the fastest signal.
Related calculators
Tired of doing this maths every month?
EXOD runs the ads, watches these numbers daily, and adjusts them for you.
See how it works