Free tool
True profit calculator
Your gross margin lies to you. See what one sale really leaves you after product cost, shipping, payment fees, returns and ad spend.
Your numbers
What one unit costs you, landed.
Your fulfilment cost per order, not what the customer pays.
Shopify Payments is ~2.9% + a fixed fee in most countries.
Orders refunded, as a % of sales.
Optional. Total ad spend ÷ orders — your blended CAC.
- Gross margin — what it looks like
- $28.00 · 70.0%
- True profit — what it actually is
- $12.64 · 31.6%
That's $15.36 per sale less than your gross margin suggests.
Where each sale goes
- Product cost$12.00
- Shipping$5.00
- Payment fees$1.16
- Returns$1.20
- Ads$8.00
- Profit$12.64
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Why gross margin lies
Gross margin is just price minus product cost, and it's the number most stores run on. But every sale also pays for shipping, payment processing, the occasional refund and the ads that brought the customer in. A store with a healthy 70% gross margin can quietly run at a 15% true margin — or below zero on discounted orders. If you only watch gross margin, you find out at the end of the quarter, from your accountant.
What this calculator counts
The number you get here is your contribution margin per sale: price, minus product cost (COGS), minus your shipping cost, minus payment fees, minus the expected cost of returns, minus what you paid in ads to win the order. It treats a refunded order as a full loss, which is slightly conservative — if you restock returns, your real number sits a touch higher.
The catch: your real numbers move every day
A calculator is a snapshot with the numbers you remember. Your actual fees vary by payment method, shipping differs per order, returns spike after campaigns, and ad spend changes daily. That's the gap Margeny closes: it pulls orders, costs and ad spend straight from your store and shows true profit per order, per product and per channel — every day, automatically.
Common questions
- What's the difference between gross margin and contribution margin?
- Gross margin only subtracts the product cost from the price. Contribution margin also subtracts the variable costs of selling: shipping, payment fees, returns and ad spend. It's the money each sale actually contributes to covering your fixed costs and profit.
- What should I enter as payment fees?
- Your effective rate. Shopify Payments charges around 2.9% + a small fixed fee per transaction in most countries (it varies by plan and country). If you use external gateways, Shopify adds an extra fee on top. When in doubt, 3% is a realistic default.
- How do returns affect the result?
- The calculator spreads the expected cost of refunds across every sale: with a 5% returns rate, each sale carries 5% of the price as expected loss. It assumes a refunded order is a full loss, which is slightly conservative if you restock returned items.
- How is this different from Shopify's profit margin calculator?
- Shopify's free calculator computes a markup from your product cost — it ignores shipping, payment fees, returns and advertising. Useful for setting a starting price, but it won't tell you what a sale actually leaves in your pocket.
Stop doing this by hand
Margeny is a Shopify app that pulls your real orders, costs, fees and ad spend and shows your true profit every day — per order, per product, per channel.
Track it automaticallyKeep reading: Contribution margin vs gross margin · How to calculate true profit on Shopify