Eat Out or Cook at Home?

Calculate the break-even point for your meal decisions

Cost Calculator
Enter your costs, time, and hourly wage to see which option makes more sense

Cost Information

$
$

How many servings would this cooking session produce? (Assume eating out gives 1 serving)

Time Information

Your Hourly Wage

$

How to Use This Calculator

Understanding Each Input

Cost to Cook at Home ($)

Include the total cost of groceries for the entire cooking session, plus any costs associated with obtaining those groceries:

  • Grocery store prices for ingredients
  • Gas costs from driving to/from the grocery store
  • Delivery fees if using grocery delivery services
  • Any other transportation costs

Note: Enter the total cost for the entire cooking session. The calculator will divide this by the number of servings to get the cost per serving.

Number of Servings

Select how many servings your cooking session produces. This is important because:

  • Cooking at home often produces multiple servings (e.g., 4 servings from one cooking session)
  • Eating out typically gives you 1 serving
  • The calculator compares cost per serving, so batch cooking becomes more valuable

Cost to Eat Out ($)

Include all costs associated with eating out:

  • Price of the meal
  • Tax
  • Tip
  • Cost of commute (gas, parking, public transit, etc.)

Time to Cook at Home (minutes)

Account for all time spent for the entire cooking session:

  • Time required to cook the meal
  • Time spent at the grocery store shopping
  • Time to clean dishes and put food away
  • Time to clean the kitchen

Note: Enter the total time for the cooking session. The calculator will divide this by the number of servings to get the time per serving.

Time to Eat Out (minutes)

Include all time spent:

  • Time at the restaurant (waiting + eating)
  • Duration of commute to the restaurant
  • Duration of commute from the restaurant back

Hourly Wage ($/hour)

Your hourly wage rate. This represents the value of your time. If you're salaried, divide your annual salary by the number of hours you work per year. I also prefer to use my post tax hourly wage rate for a more representative value of my time, but you can do whatever!

For Optimal Accuracy

The most accurate readings require you to account for all associated costs and time:

  • When cooking at home: Include commute time and cost to the grocery store, time spent shopping, dishwashing and cleanup time, and all grocery costs.
  • When eating out: Include commute time (to and from), commute costs (gas, parking, etc.), and the full meal cost including tax and tip.

Factors Not Accounted For

This is a simple heuristic-based calculator meant to be a quick reference when deciding whether to eat out or cook. When I use this tool I personally do not account for:

  • Time spent learning new recipes
  • Cost of cooking materials (oil, spices, condiments) that may be used across multiple meals
  • Decision fatigue from choosing what to cook
  • Nutritional value differences between eating out and cooking at home
  • Utility and enjoyment derived from either activity

Important Disclaimer

This calculator assumes that your time would be better spent working to earn money and then buying the meal. However, this model has limitations:

  • The average workday is 8 hours, and many people are salaried, meaning working more hours does not result in additional income.
  • If you have fixed working hours and excess free time, the assumption that working more is more valuable than cooking may not hold true because you cannot work more.
  • In such cases, you may have an abundance of time available to cook, making the "work more, eat out" model less applicable.

Use this calculator as a helpful heuristic, but consider your personal circumstances when making decisions.

How This Calculator Works

The Core Concept

This calculator treats each meal as having both a money cost and a time cost. To make the optimal decision, we compare the total cost (money + value of time) for both options.

Eating out is mathematically better when the total cost per serving of eating out is less than or equal to the total cost per serving of cooking at home:

Cout + w × Tout ≤ (Chome / N) + w × (Thome / N)

Where w is your hourly wage, C is the money cost, T is the time cost (in minutes, converted to hours), and N is the number of servings produced from the cooking session. This compares one serving from eating out to one serving from cooking.

The Break-Even Formula

The calculator solves for the break-even price (Cout*) you can pay to make eating out optimal:

Cout* = (Chome / N) + w × ((Thome / N) - Tout) / 60

Where N is the number of servings produced from the cooking session. This compares the cost per serving of cooking (since cooking often produces multiple servings) to the cost of eating out (typically 1 serving).

If your actual eating out cost is less than or equal to this break-even price, eating out is the better choice. Otherwise, cooking at home is more optimal.

Intuition & Sign Checks

  • If eating out saves time (Tout < Thome): The break-even price will be higher than your home cooking cost. The faster eating out is, and the higher your wage, the more extra money you can afford to pay for the convenience.
  • If eating out takes longer (Tout > Thome): The break-even price will be lower than your home cooking cost. Eating out must be cheaper to justify the extra time spent.
  • If times are equal (Tout = Thome): The decision reduces to comparing money only—eat out if it costs less than cooking at home.

Example

Let's say:

  • Cooking at home: $20 total cost, 60 minutes, produces 4 servings
  • Eating out: 30 minutes (faster!)
  • Your wage: $30/hour

Cost per serving = $20 / 4 = $5
Time per serving = 60 / 4 = 15 minutes
Break-even price = $5 + $30 × (15 - 30) / 60 = $5 - $7.50 = -$2.50

Since the break-even is negative, cooking at home is always better in this case. The batch cooking advantage (4 servings) makes it much more cost-effective per serving!

Future Additions to This Tool

Planned features and improvements for this calculator:

  • Automated meal cost estimation: Add an easy way to automatically check the price of a meal. This would use a chatbot to reference recipes online, then check average grocery store prices based on the user's IP address to get accurate prices based on their state/location.
  • Automatic tax and tip calculation: Automatically account for tax (for various states) and tip (based on time of day—morning to dinner). Tax rates and tip suggestions can be determined automatically based on the user's IP address location.

Have a bright idea for improving this tool? Send suggestions to chentreehwang@gmail.com.