Free tool

Meta ads budget and cost per lead calculator

Enter a monthly budget and a cost per lead, and this calculator works out how many leads and customers it should buy on Facebook and Instagram, and whether the budget reaches the roughly 50 results a week Meta says an ad set usually needs. Where we have published a cost per lead in your currency, it is offered as a preset. Where we have not, you enter your own.

Your numbers

Use the cost per result from a lead campaign in your Meta Ads Manager.

Each ad set needs its own 50 results a week.

What this Meta ads budget should buy

Expected leads a month
Not enough data
Leads a week per ad set
Not enough data
Cost per lead
Not enough data
Expected customers
Not enough data
Cost per customer (ad spend only)
Not enough data
Revenue from those customers
Not enough data
Return on ad spend
Not enough data
Total monthly ad spend C$1,500

Does not include management fees or taxes.

How to use this

How to read your numbers

Why it starts from cost per lead

On Meta you pay for your ad to be shown, and a click or a lead is a result you hope follows. The click price changes with what you ask the campaign to find, so cost per lead is the number you can multiply into a budget.

The 50 results rule

Meta's help page on the learning phase says an ad set usually settles after about 50 results in the week after its last significant edit. Until then, cost per result is usually higher and less stable. So one ad set needs about your cost per lead multiplied by 50 each week.

Learning limited is not failure

Many small budgets cannot reach 50 leads a week. The campaign can still pay, but expect lead cost to swing from week to week and judge it over a month. Putting the budget into one ad set and one offer gives the system the most to learn from.

Why most countries have no preset

Only two sets of Meta lead costs we could trace are in a stated currency: US medians by industry, and UK estate agents. The other published figures name no currency, so they appear as context in the notes below and are never multiplied into your budget. Your own Ads Manager reports in your account currency, and that is the figure that matters.

Where these numbers come from

Sources and country notes

  • There is no Canadian preset. The one benchmark we found with a stated method, Superads, shows two series that disagree with each other, and no page states a currency, so the calculator asks for your own cost per lead.
  • On that benchmark, as bare numbers, a Canadian lead sits around 37 to 40, roughly 14% to 18% below the global median. Read that as a ratio, not as a price in Canadian dollars.
  • Meta adds GST or HST unless your GST/HST ID is on the ad account. In Quebec it adds both GST and QST unless both numbers are on the account.

Get your real numbers

Want your real numbers instead of an estimate?

This calculator works from the cost per lead you enter or a published median. A free audit looks at your actual ad account, website and market to tell you what your budget should really be.

We'll include the numbers from your calculation with your request, so we can start from them.

Prefer to talk? Book a 15-min call.

Questions

Frequently asked

How much should I budget for Facebook and Instagram ads?
Work back from your cost per lead. Meta says an ad set usually leaves the learning phase after about 50 results in a week, so one ad set needs about your cost per lead times 50 each week. At the US all-industry median of US$27.39 a lead, that is US$1,369.50 a week, about US$5,934 a month. You can run on less, but expect results to swing more from week to week.
Where do I find my own cost per lead?
In Meta Ads Manager, open a lead campaign and read the Cost per result column over the last few weeks. That figure is in your own account currency. If you have never run a campaign, the guide linked under Sources explains what published figures exist for your country and how far to trust them.
Why is there no preset for my country?
Because we could not find a lead cost in a confirmed currency. The main public benchmark for Canada, Australia, India and the Gulf names no currency on its pages, and for some countries it shows two series that disagree. Putting a currency sign on those figures would put a wrong number in your budget, so the calculator asks for your own.
What does Learning limited mean for a small budget?
It means the ad set is not getting enough results for Meta's delivery system to settle, which Meta says usually takes about 50 in a week. It is not failure. The campaign can still be profitable, but lead cost will move more from week to week, so judge it over a month and avoid splitting a small budget across several ad sets.
Does this cover Instagram as well as Facebook?
Yes. Meta runs Facebook and Instagram from one ad account and one campaign, and the sources behind these figures do not split the two, so there is no separate Instagram number.
Does the total include management fees or taxes?
No. The total is ad spend only. Tax and fees differ by country: GST or HST in Canada, GST in Australia, VAT in the UK and the Gulf, GST and TDS in India, and Meta's 2% UK location fee. The country notes under the calculator say what applies where.
Are these numbers a guarantee of what I will pay or get?
No. They are planning estimates built from the cost per lead and the assumptions you enter. Your real lead cost depends on your offer, your creative and who else is advertising to the same people, and it moves from month to month. Treat this as a starting point and replace it with your own account data.