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Any calculator can divide rate by miles. This one knows what the run costs — fuel, fixed bills, maintenance, deadhead — and answers the real question: take it, counter, or pass.
Typical owner-operator costs, not yours — your real numbers come with the free checks.
Quick math on national averages: $3.90/gal diesel, 7.5 MPG, ~$0.81/mi fixed + maintenance, dry-van average market rate. Tolls not included. Real checks use your truck, this week’s diesel, the real route, tolls, your lane’s market, and the broker’s FMCSA record.
The math under the verdict
Every load board shows rate per mile. It answers one question — what the broker pays per loaded mile — and hides two: what the run costs you, and what the empty miles do to the average.
Say the offer is $2.25 a mile for 700 loaded miles, with 150 empty miles to the pickup. That’s $1,575 spread over 850 real miles — $1.85 per mile the truck actually drives. A $2.05 load with 10 deadhead miles pays $2.02. On the sample cost profile below, the “cheaper” load also keeps more actual dollars — about $491 against $445 — while putting 140 fewer miles on the truck.
That’s why this calculator asks for deadhead, and why it answers in dollars kept — not just division.
Five steps, one number
The same numbers this page’s calculator runs: $3.90/gal diesel, 7.5 MPG, $6,090 in fixed bills over 10,000 miles a month, $0.20/mi maintenance reserve.
Current market context
Two public numbers keep your math honest. ATRI — the industry’s standard operating-cost survey — puts the average carrier’s marginal cost at about $2.26 a mile in its latest report (2024 data). Almost a dollar of that is driver wages and benefits, which an owner-operator pays out of profit, so your cash floor runs lower — but your time isn’t free, and pricing it at zero is how cheap freight survives.
Fuel is the swing line. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) publishes the national average on-highway diesel price every Monday. The sample math on this page pins diesel at $3.90 a gallon; a signed-in check swaps in the current week’s number automatically.
Sources: ATRI operational costs of trucking · EIA weekly on-highway diesel prices
Is this load worth it?
The rate clears your cost floor plus your target margin, and it sits within a few percent of what the lane pays. Say yes before someone else does.
The load can work — at a better number. You get the ask: floor plus margin, never opening below the lane’s market anchor, and what you’d keep if the broker says yes.
Even a realistic counter can’t clear your floor. Walking away is the profitable move — the most expensive load is the one you haul at a loss.
The verdicts come from the same engine behind Backhaul’s full load check — this page just runs it on a sample cost profile. Want the full receipt? See a complete sample check.
Straight answers
There isn't one national number — rates move by lane, season, and equipment. The number that matters is yours: your all-in cost per mile plus the margin you want. For context, ATRI's latest operational-costs study puts the average carrier's marginal cost at about $2.26 a mile, so a load paying less than that pays below what it costs an average truck to run.
Add up your fixed monthly bills and divide by the miles you actually run in a month, then add fuel per mile (diesel price ÷ MPG) and a maintenance reserve per mile. That's your all-in cost per mile — multiply it by a load's total miles, deadhead included, to get the cost floor for that run.
Brokers quote rate per loaded mile, but your truck burns fuel, tires, and hours on every mile. Spread the load's revenue over total miles — loaded plus deadhead — before you judge it. A $2.25 loaded-mile rate with 150 empty miles can pay worse than a $2.05 load with 10.
Rate per mile is what the load pays per loaded mile. Cost per mile is what your truck spends to run a mile — fuel, fixed bills, maintenance. Profit is the gap between them, which is why this calculator shows a cost floor and a keep number instead of stopping at division.
Yes, it's free and runs right on this page — no account, no email, no card. It uses a typical owner-operator cost profile, stated under the form. When you want it on your own numbers, the first 3 real checks are free too — still no card.
A spreadsheet averages your whole year — useful once a quarter, silent at 9 pm when a broker wants an answer. This check prices one load: the floor, what you'd keep, take / counter / pass, and the counter number worth saying out loud.
The quick check on this page uses stated national averages: $3.90/gal diesel, 7.5 MPG, and a dry-van market anchor. Signed-in checks swap in this week's EIA diesel price, the real route with tolls, your cost profile, and the broker's FMCSA record.
Backhaul runs this exact check with your truck, your bills, this week’s diesel, the real route with tolls, and the broker’s FMCSA record — then keeps the math from decision to delivery to getting paid.
3 free checks · No card upfront · Cancel anytime