Runs in your browser, nothing is sent anywhere
Subscription or
build it once?
Every automation tool publishes a monthly price, which is the one number that flatters a subscription. This compares three years, with the maintenance hours counted on both sides. For most automations it will tell you to keep paying, and that is the honest answer.
Want to know what this costs in your shop?
I will work out your three biggest time sinks, in hours and dollars. Free, in writing, within 72 hours.
No newsletter, no sequence. You keep the analysis either way.
Tim Muenzel
builds and runs the systems himself
Your numbers
Keep paying
$0
over three years
Build it once
$0
over three years
The honest read
…
Year by year
| Subscription | Owned |
|---|
Assumptions are visible on purpose. Maintenance is counted on both sides, at half the hours after the build because a tested system with monitoring needs less attention, not none. Nothing here is a vendor quote, and every field is yours to change.
Common questions
Where do the default numbers come from?
They are typical mid-tier plan levels for the workflow-tool category rather than a quote from any vendor, and every one of them is editable. The calculator is a structure for your own numbers, not a price list.
Why three years?
Because one year flatters the subscription and five years flatters the build. Three is roughly how long a business process survives unchanged, and it is the horizon on which the two options actually differ: one column stops growing after year one and the other does not.
What is the maintenance figure for?
The hours somebody spends checking that last night ran, fixing what did not, and explaining the setup to whoever asks. It is real, it is rarely counted, and it exists on both sides. Set it honestly or set it to zero, but set the same standard for both columns.
It told me to keep my subscription. Is that a bug?
No, that is the most common result. For the majority of automations a subscription is the right answer and always will be. The line moves when a failed run costs money rather than patience, and when volume scales with revenue rather than with usage.
Does anything I type here get sent anywhere?
No. The whole calculation runs in your browser. There is no form, no submission, and nothing is stored. Measurement on this site is cookieless and records only which page was viewed.
Related reading
Want the same arithmetic on your actual processes?
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