New research: The State of SaaS: Build vs. Buy, October 2026.The State of SaaS, October 2026. Read the report
Build vs. Buy Calculator
Six quick questions. See 5 years of rent next to owning your own, on a receipt you can share.
Every result is an estimate, not a quote. How we estimate.
Search any company, or type a name we don't list yet.
Try a company (Salesforce), a product (Dynamics, Jira) or a category (help desk).
1. What paying costs
Your yearly spend, rising 12% a year, plus the staff time the tool should save but doesn't.
2. What owning costs
A one-time build for the parts worth owning, then a monthly cost for an engineer on call and hosting.
3. What to keep paying for
Parts that are hard to run yourself, like email sending or payments, stay rented in the estimate.
What one tool costs you in licenses and staff time over 5 years, next to an estimate of building your own version and keeping it running for the same 5 years.
Typical build costs for each software category, plus extra costs for specific tools where we have them, such as moving your data. It assumes a 12% yearly renewal increase on the tool you rent.
Your answers are saved without your name, email or company and added to the anonymous data on company pages, like what teams pay and how much of a tool they use.
No. It's an estimate to help you decide whether to look closer. Get real quotes from builders before you decide.
Full assumptions: methodology. Real results from teams that built: stories.