Tech Debt Cost Calculator
Put a dollar figure on a tech debt item - see its cost of delay and how fast a fix pays for itself.
The debt item
Editable estimates. Enter what this debt costs and what fixing it takes.
Result
Worth fixingTurning tech debt into a number
Tech debt arguments stall because they stay qualitative - "this slows us down" versus "we have features to ship." The way out is to price it. Multiply the hours each developer loses per week by the number of developers affected and a blended hourly cost, and you get a concrete weekly bleed. Leave it unfixed for a quarter and that becomes a cost of delay you can put in front of anyone deciding where the next sprint goes.
The other half is the fix. A payback period - one-time fix cost divided by the weekly waste it removes - tells you how fast the work earns its keep. When payback lands well inside your horizon, the fix is usually a clear yes; when it stretches past it, the debt may be cheaper to carry. For the delivery side of the same picture, see our cycle time guide and reducing PR review time.
Estimates start the conversation; measured data ends it. Instead of guessing at lost hours, watch where debt actually shows up - rework, slow reviews, flaky pipelines - with engineering metrics, dig into cycle time analytics, or browse the rest of our free tools.
Frequently asked questions
Measure the debt - don't argue about it
FeatureFactory surfaces where tech debt actually costs you time, so you can prioritise fixes with data instead of gut feel.
Get early access