SDR cost calculator

Pick a country and see what an SDR really costs: salary, tools, ramp time and tenure, and the cost per meeting.

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An SDR in United States costs $8,983 a month, $1,013 per meeting.

That is $107,800 a year with taxes, commission, manager and tools. After 3 months of ramp and a median 14 months in the seat, you get 11 productive months to pay back $133,767.

Loaded a year

$107,800

Salary, taxes, commission, manager, tools

Productive months

14 in seat minus 3 ramp

Total over tenure

$133,767

Includes $8,000 to hire

Per productive month

$12,161

12 meetings a month

The same meetings on Ken

12 meetings a month

SDR, per meeting

$1,013

Ramp and turnover included

Ken, per meeting

$96.67

$1,160 a month at Ken's published 7 meetings per 10,000 contacts

Ken is $917 cheaper per meeting. Ken's rate is what is possible, not a promise, and an SDR also handles calls, replies and the meeting itself.

How long SDRs stay

Share still in the seat, 363,028 SDRs

After 3 months

95%

After 6 months

82%

After 12 months

57%

After 24 months

26%

Ken research, MAR-48: Kaplan-Meier time in an SDR or BDR seat, 363,028 people who started 2012-2025 across six countries, Ken work data snapshot 2026-06.

Where these numbers come from

Months in the seat

Ken studyMAR-48: median 14 months in US, n=276,664.

Ramp

3 months

GuidelineThe Bridge Group, SDR Models, Motions and Metrics 2025: average SDR ramp time 3.0 months.

Salary, commission, tools

$55,000

AssumptionPlanning defaults in USD, not from MAR-48. Replace them with your own offer letters before you rely on the result.

Meetings per ramped SDR

12 a month

AssumptionPlanning default for a ramped SDR. Change it to your team's number.

Tenure is time in an SDR or BDR seat, from Ken's MAR-48 study. Replace it with your own team's number if you have one.

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The full cost of the SDR, the comparison with Ken and the sources, with a saved link that stays live for 90 days.

Loaded cost and cost per meetingSDR against KenSources for tenure and ramp

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What the SDR cost calculator does

It works out what a sales development rep costs once everything is counted, and what each meeting they book costs. Pick a country or stage preset, then adjust base salary, commission, tools, manager time, recruiting cost and the employer burden on top of salary.

Two numbers most calculators skip are filled in for you. Ramp time defaults to 3 months, The Bridge Group's 2025 average. Tenure defaults to the median from Ken's SDR tenure study for your country or stage. Both are cited on the page and you can change them.

How to read the result

The top line shows the fully loaded monthly cost and cost per meeting. The strip under it shows the loaded annual cost, the productive months, the total over tenure and the cost per productive month. The tenure bars show how many SDRs are still in the seat after 3, 6, 12 and 24 months.

Productive months are tenure minus ramp.
Cost per productive month spreads the whole cost of the hire, recruiting included, over the months they work at full output.
Cost per meeting divides that by the meetings a ramped rep books, 12 a month by default.

The comparison card prices the same meetings on an outbound platform.

How to use it

Use your real offer for salary and commission, and your real tool bill. If you have hired SDRs before, replace the tenure default with your own average, because it moves the result more than salary does. Then test a shorter tenure: if the cost per meeting still works when a rep leaves early, the hire is safe.

Why it matters for outbound

The salary is the visible part. With a 14-month tenure and a 3-month ramp, about a fifth of the time you pay for is spent learning the job, and recruiting starts again when the rep leaves. Cost per productive month and cost per meeting show the real price of in-house outbound before you open the role.

Questions

How much does an SDR cost?

Base salary plus commission, plus employer taxes and benefits, tools, a share of a manager's time and recruiting. Spread over the months a rep is productive, the cost is well above the salary line. Pick your country preset to see the full stack.

How long does it take an SDR to ramp?

The Bridge Group's 2025 SDR metrics report puts the average ramp at 3 months, which is the default here. Complex products and enterprise sales usually take longer.

How long do SDRs stay in the role?

The median tenure in the study used here is 14 months, with presets by country and company stage. Many SDRs leave by moving into an account executive role, which is good for them and still a vacancy for you.

What is a burden rate?

The employer cost on top of salary: payroll taxes, pension contributions, health insurance and other benefits. It defaults to 20% in the US preset and lower in some other countries. Use your own payroll numbers if you have them.

How many meetings should an SDR book a month?

The calculator assumes 12 meetings a month for a ramped rep as a planning default, not a benchmark. Set it to what your reps actually book, since it changes the cost per meeting directly.