AI time savings calculator

The calculator Hours and money reclaimed per year

Finding the one task worth handing to AI first is the whole method in AI for Your Business: Basics →

How to read it Reclaimed hours are only slack until you spend them

This box tells you how much time a single repetitive task gives back once AI does the heavy lifting, and what that time is worth at what the work actually costs you per hour. It's the first honest number to have before you pay for any tool: if a task barely moves, no subscription will earn its keep on it.

But be careful with the money figure. Reclaimed hours only turn into money if they're redeployed to something valuable — more billable work, more sales calls, a project that's been waiting. If the freed-up time just becomes slack that quietly fills back up, you've saved hours on paper and nothing in the bank. Treat the yearly pound figure as the ceiling of the saving, unlocked only when someone actually uses the time.

The formula, in full

Minutes saved per week = (minutes before − minutes after) × times done per week × people doing it. Hours saved per year = that weekly figure × 52 ÷ 60. Money saved per year = the yearly hours × your loaded hourly cost — the wage plus tax, tools and overhead, not the bare salary. If "after" is somehow larger than "before", the saving is zero: the task got slower, not faster.

A worked example

A task takes 30 minutes by hand and 5 with AI, so each run saves 25 minutes. It's done 20 times a week across a team of 3, which is 25 × 20 × 3 = 1,500 minutes a week. Over a year that's 1,500 × 52 ÷ 60 = 1,300 hours. At a loaded cost of £30 an hour, the task reclaims 1,300 × £30 = £39,000 a year — but only if those 1,300 hours go somewhere that matters.

Edge cases the calculator handles

• "After" longer than "before" settles to zero saved, with a note — because AI made the task slower, so there's nothing to reclaim.
• "After" at 0 minutes is allowed but rarely honest. AI seldom takes a task all the way to nothing — someone still reviews, edits and signs off — so a realistic "after" is a few minutes, not zero.

Common questions

How do I get the before-and-after minutes?

Measure them, don't guess. Time the real task on a handful of runs the way it's done now, then run the same batch through your AI tool and time that — including the checking and fixing. A guessed "after" of two minutes flatters every number below it; a measured one keeps this honest.

What counts as the loaded hourly cost?

Not the bare wage. Add employer tax, software, equipment and a share of overhead — the full cost of putting a person on this work for an hour. It's usually well above the salary rate, and it's the figure that makes the yearly saving realistic rather than rosy.

Is this financial advice or a guarantee?

No. It's arithmetic on numbers you enter. Whether the saving is real depends on the task, the tool, and whether the reclaimed hours get redeployed to something worthwhile — none of which this box controls. It just sizes the prize before you spend on a tool to chase it.