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Bid cost calculator: what does each tender really cost you?

Enter your team's day rates and days, your external costs and your win rate. See your cost per bid, cost per win, break-even win rate and what AI could save, instantly.

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1. Your bid team, per bid

  • £
    days
  • £
    days
  • £
    days
  • £
    days

Staff time costed at £5,650 per bid across 12 days.

2. External costs, per bid

  • £
  • £
  • £

3. Your pipeline

Bids per year

Win rate

%
£
%

Your cost of bidding

Cost per bid

£7,550

Cost per win

£30,200

Annual bid spend

£151,000

Return on bid spend

-1%

5.0 wins a year, each worth about £30,000 profit.

25.2%

Break-even win rate

You win 25%. You are 0.2 points short of paying for your bids.

A year of bidding at a glance

  • Annual bid spend today£151,000
  • With AI Tender Writer£76,588
  • Profit from wins£150,000

What if AI did the first draft?

New cost per bid

£3,740

6.6 days, down from 12

New cost per win

£15,318

break-even 12.8%

Saving a year, after £149/month for Pro

£74,412

Assumes freelance bid writer fees are replaced by AI Tender Writer Pro (£149/month, £1,788 a year) and ticked writing roles spend 60% less time. Reviews, pricing and SME input stay as they are.

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How it works

The cost of bidding, in five numbers

Most firms know what a bid writer invoices. Few know what a bid really costs, because most of it is internal time: the bid manager chasing inputs, operations leads writing method statements, and directors reading drafts late at night. This calculator puts a price on all of it.

  • Cost per bid is every person's day rate times days spent, plus external costs.
  • Annual bid spend is cost per bid times bids per year.
  • Cost per win is annual spend divided by the contracts you win.
  • Return on bid spend compares the profit from those wins (contract value times margin) with what you spent bidding.
  • Break-even win rate is cost per bid divided by profit per win. Below it, bidding loses money.

Worked example

The defaults above model a typical mid-sized supplier. A bid manager at £450 a day for 5 days, a writer at £400 for 4 days, subject experts at £500 for 2 days and a director at £800 for a day comes to £5,650 of time. Add £1,500 for a freelance bid writer, £250 design and £150 accreditation share, and one bid costs £7,550.

At 20 bids a year that is £151,000. Winning 25% means 5 contracts, so each win cost £30,200. On a £300,000 contract at 10% margin, each win earns £30,000, so the break-even win rate is 25.2%. This firm is working hard to stand still.

If AI cuts writing time by 60% and replaces the freelance fee with AI Tender Writer Pro at £149 a month, the cost per bid drops to £3,740 and annual spend to about £76,600 including the subscription. That frees roughly £74,000 a year, or the time to bid for more of the right contracts.

UK rules that affect your cost to tender

The Procurement Act 2023 came into force on 24 February 2025 for procurements started on or after that date. Buyers now publish notices on the central digital platform, which runs on Find a Tender, and suppliers register once and share their core details across tenders. Keeping that information current saves time on every bid.

The Act also introduced the competitive flexible procedure, which lets buyers design stages such as dialogue or negotiation. That can add days to a bid, so check the procedure in the tender notice before you commit. After award, bidders receive an assessment summary showing how their tender was scored, which is free coaching for raising your win rate.

The cheapest bid is the one you do not submit. Screen every opportunity with our bid / no-bid matrix, read the guide to winning government tenders, and browse live UK contracts to find the ones worth your time. The bid writing guide covers how to cut rewriting between drafts.

Halve your cost per bid.

AI Tender Writer drafts every answer from your company profile and evidence, inside the word limit, for any sector. Compare plans on the pricing page.

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Bid cost questions, answered

How much does it cost to bid for a tender in the UK?

It depends on the size of the tender and who writes it, which is why this calculator asks for your own day rates and days. Add up every person's time at their day rate, then add external costs such as freelance bid writer fees, design, print and your share of accreditation costs. Many firms find a mid-sized public sector bid costs several thousand pounds once directors' review time is counted, and far more for large frameworks.

What is the difference between cost per bid and cost per win?

Cost per bid is what one submission costs you. Cost per win is your total annual bid spend divided by the number of contracts you win. If each bid costs £7,550 and you win one in four, every win has really cost you £30,200. Cost per win is the number to compare against the profit a contract makes.

What is a break-even win rate?

It is the win rate at which the profit from the contracts you win exactly pays for all the bids you submit. The calculator works it out as cost per bid divided by profit per win. If your actual win rate sits below it, bidding is losing you money on those contracts, so you either need to bid more selectively, cut the cost per bid, or target larger contracts.

Should I include staff salaries if they would be paid anyway?

Yes. Staff time spent on a bid is time not spent on delivery, sales or management, so it has an opportunity cost. Use a loaded day rate (salary plus employer costs and overheads) or the rate you would charge a client. Leaving internal time out is the most common reason firms underestimate their cost of bidding.

How does AI reduce the cost to tender?

Most bid hours go on first drafts: reading the pack, pulling evidence from old bids and writing answers to the word limit. AI Tender Writer drafts those answers from your company profile and evidence, so your team edits instead of writing from a blank page. Set the slider to the saving you think is realistic; the calculator keeps review, pricing and expert input unchanged.

Does the Procurement Act 2023 change the cost of bidding?

The Procurement Act 2023 came into force on 24 February 2025 and applies to procurements started from that date. It brought in a central digital platform, new procedures such as the competitive flexible procedure, and assessment summaries that explain how your bid was scored. Flexible procedures can mean more stages, so budget for extra time, but the feedback helps you raise your win rate.

Is this bid cost calculator only for facilities management?

No. It works for any sector bidding for UK public or private contracts: construction, IT and digital, health and social care, consultancy, transport, facilities and more. Every role, rate and cost is editable, so you can model your own team.

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