Free raise calculator

How this raise calculator works

Most founders size a round by looking at what companies like theirs announced on LinkedIn. That is backwards: the announcement is the output of someone else's burn and plan, not an input to yours. This calculator does the sum in the order investors will check it, and shows its working at every step.

Step one: your projected burn

The raise has to fund the company you are becoming, not the one you are today. So the starting point is projected monthly burn: current net burn, plus every planned hire at a fully-loaded monthly cost, plus new recurring spend that is not headcount - infrastructure, paid acquisition, an office.

Fully loaded is the phrase that saves you here. A $120k salary is roughly $13k to $14k a month once employer taxes, benefits, equipment and tooling are counted. Budget salaries alone across a six-person hiring plan and you have silently deleted two to three months of runway.

Step two: your runway target

The default is 24 months, and it is not arbitrary. You need to hit the milestones that unlock the next round, then spend about six months raising it, and still have margin for the quarter that goes sideways. Eighteen months is the sensible floor; 36 is the ceiling before the extra dilution stops buying you anything except comfort.

Step three: buffer and a clean number

Projected burn times target months gives the base. The calculator then adds a 15 percent buffer - for the hire that costs more, the raise that starts late, the surprise - and rounds the result up to a number you could actually say in a meeting. Nobody raises $2,287,400. The rounding lands in the buffer, so nothing is hidden.

Step four: the use-of-funds breakdown

Finally it allocates the round across the four buckets investors expect to see: team, product and infrastructure, go-to-market, and buffer. Your hiring plan flows straight into the team line; your current burn is apportioned by stage, because a pre-seed company's spend is mostly product while a Series A company is buying distribution. The percentages are a starting slide, not a contract.

What to do with the result

Sense-check it three ways. Against your dilution - a round that would cost 35 percent of the company is the market telling you the number is too big for your stage; run it through the dilution calculator. Against your stage - the round picker will tell you whether the market at your traction actually writes cheques this size. And against founders one round ahead of you, who know what your investors will really price.

One more thing worth saying plainly, since most calculators will not: the number is the easy part. Almost nobody fails a raise because they asked for the wrong amount. They fail because the process sprawls - forty investors, no follow-ups, a pipeline living in someone's head. That is the problem worth solving, and it is the one Raised was built for.

Frequently asked questions

How much should a startup raise?

Enough to fund 18 to 24 months of your projected burn - not today's burn, the burn after the hires the money pays for - plus a buffer of around 15 percent. Less than 18 months means you are fundraising again before the milestones land. Much more than 30 months usually means extra dilution for cash that sits in the account.

Why 24 months of runway?

A round needs to cover reaching the next round's milestones, plus the roughly six months the next raise itself takes, plus slack for the things that will go wrong. Twelve months of building, six of raising and six of buffer is why 24 has become the default. Cut it to 18 if your milestones are close; stretch toward 30 to 36 if your market punishes frequent raises.

What is a fully-loaded cost per hire?

Salary is only part of what a hire costs. Employer taxes, benefits, equipment, software seats and recruiting typically add 20 to 40 percent on top. If you budget the salary line alone, a four-person hiring plan quietly under-counts burn by the cost of a whole extra person.

What is a use-of-funds breakdown and do investors ask for it?

It is the slide showing where the money goes - typically team, product and infrastructure, go-to-market, and buffer. Almost every serious investor asks for it, not because they will hold you to the percentages, but because it shows whether the round size came from a plan or from a vibe.

Should I raise the buffer too, or a leaner round?

Raise the buffer. Raises take longer than planned, hires cost more than planned, and something unbudgeted always appears. A 15 percent buffer costs you a little extra dilution now; running out of money three months before the milestone costs you the company's negotiating position, and sometimes the company.