How Much Do Your Meetings Cost?
Pick a calculator and see the real price of time spent in meetings.
In a meeting right now? Watch the dollars add up live.
How We Calculate Meeting Cost
The formula is simple. The total might surprise you.
The Formula
- Hourly Rates: Annual salary ÷ 2,080 work hours
- Overhead: 1.35× for benefits, taxes, equipment (US average)
- Duration: Meeting length in hours
Worked Example: Weekly Standup
How Meeting Costs Add Up
The true cost of meetings goes far beyond the calendar invite. Here's what the research shows.
31 hours
Spent in meetings per month
The average knowledge worker spends nearly a full work week in meetings every month.
Harvard Business Review67%
Feel meetings are unproductive
Two-thirds of employees say meetings prevent them from completing their actual work.
Harvard Business Review$25,000
Wasted per employee annually
Unnecessary meetings cost organizations thousands per employee each year.
AtlassianThe Hidden Costs of Every Meeting
The Hidden Costs You Don't See
Salary is just the starting point. Fully-loaded costs include employer taxes, health insurance, retirement contributions, and overhead -adding 20-35% to base salary depending on your region.
Beyond the Dollar Figure
Context switching costs 23 minutes to refocus. Add preparation time, follow-up work, meeting notes, and action items. The opportunity cost? What your team could have built instead.
The Compounding Effect
A 30-minute meeting with 8 people isn't 30 minutes - it's 4 hours of collective productivity. Across standups, reviews, and ad-hoc syncs, this becomes thousands of hours per year.
How do your meetings compare?
See how top-performing companies approach meeting culture differently.
Hours in meetings per week
Average
23 hours
Top 10%
12 hours
The best companies spend half as much time in meetings
Source: Microsoft Work Trend Index
Meeting recovery time
Average
23 minutes
Top 10%
0 minutes
Async means no recovery time, you stay in the zone
Source: UC Irvine Research
Meetings deemed unnecessary
Average
67%
Top 10%
25%
Two-thirds of people think their meetings are a waste
Source: Harvard Business Review
Meeting hours at scale
Based on 23 hours/employee/week average. This is time that could be spent on actual work.
| Employees | Weekly hours in meetings | Annual meeting hours |
|---|---|---|
| 10 | 230 | 11,960 |
| 50 | 1,150 | 59,800 |
| 100 | 2,300 | 119,600 |
| 500 | 11,500 | 598,000 |
Ready to see what meetings cost your organization?