ROI Calculator
ROI is the plainest return measure there is: what you got back, minus what it cost, divided by what it cost. It works for a share purchase, a rental flat, a marketing campaign or a piece of machinery, and it needs no dates and no compounding assumptions. This calculator returns the percentage together with the rupee gain and the money multiple, and points you to a better tool when the percentage alone would mislead.
Enter values
Results
- ROI
- 60%
- Absolute gain
- ₹1,20,000.00
- Money multiple
- 1.6×
How is the ROI calculated?
Enter the total cost — purchase price plus the charges needed to own it — the value at exit, and any income the investment produced along the way such as rent, dividends or coupons. Leave income at zero for a pure capital gain. The calculator divides the combined gain by the cost to produce the ROI, then reports the absolute gain in rupees and how many times your money came back.
Formula
ROI = (final value + income − cost) ÷ cost × 100 where cost is everything you paid to own it, final value what you sold it for and income any cash it produced meanwhile. A cost of zero leaves the ratio undefined, so the calculator shows an em dash rather than an absurd number.
Example
You buy a machine for ₹2,00,000, collect ₹20,000 of rent while running it, then sell it for ₹3,00,000. The gain is 3,00,000 + 20,000 − 2,00,000 = ₹1,20,000, so ROI = 1,20,000 ÷ 2,00,000 × 100 = 60% and you received 1.6 times your money back. Spread that same result over four years and the annual picture changes completely — which is the gap CAGR fills.
Things to remember
ROI shines as a quick, universally understood screen for whether an opportunity earned its cost, and it compares most easily when every input carries the same meaning. It stops short of rating quality once timing and risk enter the picture, so pair it with an annualised measure like CAGR when horizons differ.
Frequently Asked Questions
What counts as a good ROI on an investment?
It depends entirely on the horizon: 10% in a single year beats the long-run equity average, while 10% spread across ten years barely keeps pace with inflation. Indian equity investors expect 10–12% annually, so judge any ROI against that rate over a comparable period.
What is the difference between ROI and profit margin?
ROI measures the gain against what the investment cost, so the full outlay is the denominator. Profit margin measures profit against revenue and belongs to pricing a product or business — a shop can run a 40% margin while the owner's return on the money invested in it is another figure.
Does ROI take the holding period into account?
No, and that is its main limitation — the percentage covers the entire period you entered, however long that was. Convert it to an annual figure with CAGR before comparing it with investments held for different lengths of time.
Should rent or dividends be included in ROI?
Yes, when the income came from the investment itself: adding rent, dividends or interest to the exit value shows the true return of owning it. Leave the income field at zero whenever you only want the capital gain measured on the price alone.
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