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Economic order quantity (EOQ) calculator

Compute the order quantity that minimizes total inventory cost.

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The Economic order quantity (EOQ) calculator turns Annual demand (units), Cost per order, Holding cost per unit/year into Economic order quantity, instantly and for free. For instance, with Annual demand (units) = 10,000, Cost per order = $50.00 and Holding cost per unit/year = $2.00 it returns Economic order quantity = 707.

How to use it

  1. Enter your values: Annual demand (units), Cost per order, Holding cost per unit/year.
  2. Read the result instantly: Economic order quantity.
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Frequently asked questions

How does the Economic order quantity (EOQ) calculator work?

It takes Annual demand (units), Cost per order and Holding cost per unit/year and derives Economic order quantity from them. The calculation is live as you type, so the result updates on every change.

Which values does the calculator ask for?

3 values: Annual demand (units), Cost per order ($) and Holding cost per unit/year ($). Nothing else is required — no account, no file upload.

What does a typical calculation look like?

With Annual demand (units) = 10,000, Cost per order = $50.00 and Holding cost per unit/year = $2.00, the calculator returns Economic order quantity = 707. Those figures come from running this exact tool, so you can reproduce them by entering the same values.

How much does the result change with different inputs?

It moves a lot. Using Annual demand (units) = 20,000, Cost per order = $100.00 and Holding cost per unit/year = $4.00 instead, Economic order quantity goes from 707 to 1,000 — which is why it is worth testing a few scenarios rather than trusting a single figure.

What does it give for smaller values?

Scaled down to Annual demand (units) = 5,000, Cost per order = $25.00 and Holding cost per unit/year = $1.00, Economic order quantity comes out at 500. The relationship is worth checking at both ends before you rely on a single result.

When would I actually use this?

Running the week: issuing an invoice or a quote, knowing what is in stock and what to reorder, and seeing whether cash covers what is due.

What is the most common mistake?

Reading profit as cash. A profitable month with sixty-day payment terms can still leave the account empty — the two numbers answer different questions.

What is the difference between the Economic order quantity (EOQ) calculator and the Takt time calculator?

This one returns Economic order quantity; the Takt time calculator returns Takt time (minutes/unit). That is the whole difference — open the one whose figure you need.

Is there a tool for the next step?

Double declining depreciation calculator is the closest one after this: Compute the first-year double-declining-balance depreciation of an asset.

What else is worth having open alongside it?

Reorder point calculator and Safety stock calculator — they come up in the same task often enough to be worth a second tab.

Further reading

All guides →
ExplainerThe EOQ Square-Root Formula, and Where It Stops Being TrueEOQ = √(2DS/H) balances ordering cost against holding cost. Its most useful property is how flat the cost curve is around the optimum — and its four failure modes are quantity discounts, lumpy demand, a finite replenishment rate, and the two inputs nobody can measure.ExplainerThe Reorder Point Is a Quantity That Answers a Question About TimeSelling 100 a day with a ten-day lead time and 300 units of safety stock, you reorder at 1,300 — not because 1,300 is a comfortable level, but because that is what ten days of selling costs.ExplainerA 30 % Sell-Through Is Excellent or Alarming, and the Missing Word Is "When"120 units sold out of 400 received is 30 %. Whether that is a success depends entirely on how long it took, and the rate on its own does not carry the answer.ExplainerFour Points of Service Level Cost 41 % More StockGoing from a 95 % service level to 99 % raises the z-score from 1.645 to 2.326 and the safety stock from 346 units to 488. The last few points of availability are the expensive ones.ExplainerThe Count Says 48,200 and the Books Say 50,000A gap of 1,800 is a shrinkage rate of 3.6 %. The percentage is the number that travels; the absolute figure is the one that pays for the fix.ExplainerGMROI: the Inventory Number That Outranks MarginGross margin return on inventory investment divides gross margin by the cash tied up in stock. It exists because margin alone ranks products wrongly: a 60% margin turning twice a year loses to a 25% margin turning twelve times.
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