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Break-even ROAS:
where ads stop paying

Your average order and its costs. See the ROAS below which an ad loses money on every order it brings in — and the ROAS that keeps the margin you want.

As the customer paid it, VAT included
Share of sales, before VAT
Your side of it, per order
Stripe, PayPal, Shopify Payments
Share of revenue refunded
After ads, as a share of the order
VAT is part of the price your customer pays, so it comes out first

An example to start from — type your own store’s figures.

Break-even ROAS

2.53×

Below this, every order the ads bring in loses money. An order leaves €23.72 before ads.

ROAS to keep 10%
3.39×
Most an order can cost in ads
€23.72
…and still keep 10%
€17.72

Of a €60.00 order: VAT €9.20, goods €16.94, shipping €6.00, fees €1.74, returns €2.40 — the rest, €23.72, is all the ads can take.

See pricing

01 / How it is worked out

The arithmetic, in the open

The order is run through the same arithmetic as Profflow’s profit calculator and its dashboard: VAT comes out of the price, then returns, the cost of goods, shipping and the payment fee. What is left is what the order contributes before ads.

Profit falls one for one with ad spend, so the most an order can cost in ads is exactly that contribution. Break-even ROAS is the order value divided by it. To keep a margin, that margin comes off the contribution first, and the ROAS is worked out on what remains.

It is one average order. On a connected store each campaign is judged on the orders it actually brought in, which can sit far above or below the average.

02 / Questions

What people ask with it

  • What is break-even ROAS?

    The return on ad spend at which an order’s profit is exactly zero: the ad took everything the order left after goods, shipping, fees and returns. Above it the ads make money; below it every order they bring in costs money.

  • Why is my break-even ROAS higher than I thought?

    Because ad platforms count revenue as the customer paid it. In Europe and the UK that includes VAT, which is not the shop’s, and none of it pays for goods, shipping or fees. The ROAS that pays has to clear all of them.

  • What is the maximum cost per acquisition?

    The most an order can cost in ads before it loses money — the same line as break-even ROAS, written in money per order instead of a ratio.

  • How does Profflow do this on a connected store?

    It judges each campaign and ad on the margin of the orders it actually brought in, product by product, instead of one average order — and says which ones are above the line and which are below it.

03 / More free tools

The other questions, answered the same way

See it on your own store.

This is an estimate from the figures you typed. A connected store is measured order by order — read-only, in about ten minutes.

Install on Shopify See pricing