Know how long your cash lasts.
Enter your cash on hand, your monthly expenses and your monthly revenue to see your net burn, your gross burn, your runway in months, and the date your cash hits zero at the current pace.
Your numbers
Expenses are every cost: salaries, rent, tools, marketing. Revenue is recurring monthly income.
What this means for survival
Expenses vs revenue
The gap between the two bars is your net burn
Cash balance to zero
Survival scorecard
Cash balance month by month
Assumes expenses and revenue stay flat at today's numbers. The balance falls by your net burn every month until it reaches zero.
| Month | Revenue | Expenses | Net burn | Cash left |
|---|
Burn rate, explained
Net vs Gross Burn
Gross burn = total monthly expenses. Net burn = expenses minus revenue. Net burn is the true cash drain. Investors typically ask about net burn when discussing runway.
Healthy Burn Rate
Depends on stage and revenue trajectory. Pre-revenue: keep burn low until product-market fit. Early revenue: burn to fund growth. Approaching profitability: actively reduce burn.
Burn Multiple Metric
Net new revenue / net burn. >1.0 = adding more ARR than burning cash. <0.5 = inefficient growth. Target 1.0+ for venture scaling.
Cutting Burn Strategically
Cut: discretionary marketing, contractors, tools, perks. Don't cut: core engineering, sales, customer-facing reduce-only when survival demands. Layoffs are last resort but sometimes necessary.
Common questions
Should startup focus on revenue or burn?
Both. Healthy growth = revenue growing while burn stays controlled. Pure burn cutting without revenue = managed decline.
What burn rate is too high?
Depends on runway and traction. $100k/month burn with 18 months runway and growing revenue is fine. Same burn with 6 months runway is dangerous.
How to reduce burn without firing?
Reduce paid marketing, switch tools (cheaper alternatives), renegotiate vendor contracts, sublease office space, salary reductions, equity in lieu of cash.
What's a good burn multiple?
Above 1.0 is venture-grade. 1.5-2.0+ is efficient growth. Below 0.5 suggests inefficient capital usage.
Should profitable companies track burn?
Less critical but still monitor cash position. Even profitable companies can have temporary high-burn periods (product launches, expansion).
Estimates for planning only. Real runway depends on how your expenses and revenue actually change month to month, one-time costs, and timing of collections. Update these numbers every month as your cash and burn change.