To price a load before you book it, divide the all-in rate by every mile you will run to haul it, both loaded and empty, then compare that rate per mile to your own cost per mile. If it clears your cost with money left over for you, it is worth booking. If it does not, let it go.
That sounds simple, and it is. The trouble is that most drivers only look at the big number the broker throws out and the loaded miles on the rate sheet. Those two numbers hide the empty miles, the waiting time, and the days the load ties up your truck. Price a load the right way and you stop hauling freight that keeps you busy but broke.
Key Takeaways
- The real rate per mile is the all-in pay divided by loaded miles plus deadhead miles, not the number printed on the broker’s rate sheet.
- You cannot price a single load until you know your own cost per mile cold, because a rate means nothing until you hold it against your cost.
- Deadhead miles burn fuel and add wear while earning zero revenue, so leaving them out of the math is the single most common way drivers overpay themselves on paper.
- Time is half the equation: a load that ties up your truck for three days to do one day of work can lose to a shorter haul that turns fast.
- Freight rates swing by lane, season, and equipment type, so check current load-board or rate-index data instead of anchoring to a number a buddy quoted last year.
- The goal of every load is not to break even, it is to pay yourself, cover surprises, and set aside a cushion for the slow weeks that always come.
Start with the all-in rate
The all-in rate is the total dollars you will get paid for the whole load. Not the rate per mile, not the linehaul before fuel surcharge, the full amount that lands in your pocket when the load delivers.
Get everything in that number before you do any math:
- Linehaul, the base pay for moving the freight.
- Fuel surcharge, if the load has one.
- Any accessorials you are sure to collect, like a stop-off or a detention guarantee.
Leave out anything you are not certain to be paid. A detention rate that only kicks in after three hours is a maybe, not a sure thing. Price the load on the money you can count on. If you build a load’s profit around detention pay that never shows up because the shipper loaded you in two hours, you priced a load that was never really there.
A quick worked example. Say a broker offers you a linehaul of around 1,100 dollars with a fuel surcharge of roughly 250 dollars and a firm stop-off of about 75 dollars. Your all-in rate is the sum of the three, close to 1,425 dollars. That is the number you build everything else on. A phantom detention guarantee that only pays after you sit for hours does not belong in that total until you have actually sat and earned it.
Divide by every mile, not just the loaded ones
Here is where most of the leak happens. The broker’s rate sheet shows loaded miles, the distance from pickup to delivery. But your truck runs more miles than that.
Deadhead is the empty distance you drive to get to the pickup. If the load pays 500 loaded miles but you have to run 150 empty miles to reach the shipper, you are really turning 650 miles to earn that money. The fuel and wear on those 150 miles come straight out of your pocket.
So the real rate per mile looks like this:
Rate per mile = All-in rate / (Loaded miles + Deadhead miles)
Watch what deadhead does to the same load. Take an all-in rate of 1,425 dollars over 500 loaded miles.
| Deadhead miles | Total miles | Real rate per mile |
|---|---|---|
| 0 empty miles | 500 | about 2.85 per mile |
| 75 empty miles | 575 | about 2.48 per mile |
| 150 empty miles | 650 | about 2.19 per mile |
| 250 empty miles | 750 | about 1.90 per mile |
The pay never changed. The load is the exact same freight for the exact same dollars. But the honest rate per mile fell from roughly 2.85 to roughly 1.90 just from the empty miles you have to run to reach it. That is why two drivers can look at the same posted load and reach opposite conclusions. The one parked near the pickup is looking at a strong number. The one 250 miles away is looking at a thin one, and only the deadhead math tells them apart.
Run those empty miles through our deadhead calculator so you know exactly what the empty leg is costing you before you commit.
Know your cost per mile first
Before you can judge any rate, you need one number of your own: your cost per mile. This is the all-in figure to keep your truck earning, and it has two halves.
Fixed costs stay roughly the same whether you run 2,000 miles a month or 12,000. They include your truck payment, insurance, permits, base plates, and any parking or trailer costs. Variable costs move with the miles: fuel, tires, oil, and the maintenance that piles up mile by mile. On top of both, add the pay you actually want to draw for yourself, because a truck that only covers its own bills is a job that pays nothing.
To turn all of that into a per-mile number, add up a full year of fixed costs, variable costs, and your target pay, then divide by the miles you realistically expect to run in that year:
Cost per mile = (Yearly fixed + Yearly variable + Your pay) / Yearly miles
Here is a rough illustration, not a promise about your truck. Say your fixed costs run in the neighborhood of a few thousand dollars a month, fuel and maintenance push your variable costs higher still, and you want to draw a real salary. Add a year of all three and divide by a typical annual mileage in the range many owner-operators run, and you land somewhere in the low-to-mid dollars per mile. The exact figure is yours alone, and it moves when fuel prices swing or a big repair hits. That is the point: you rebuild this number as your costs change, and you never guess at it.
If you have not figured yours yet, work it out with our cost per mile calculator. Every driver should know this number cold, the way you know your own phone number, because it is the line every load has to clear.
Compare it to your cost per mile
Now you have a real rate per mile and you know your cost per mile. The next question is simple. Does the rate beat what it costs you to run?
The gap between your rate per mile and your cost per mile is your profit per mile. Multiply that gap by the miles and you have what the load actually puts in your pocket.
| Rate per mile vs cost per mile | What it means |
|---|---|
| Rate is well above your cost | Strong load, book it |
| Rate is a little above your cost | Thin, only take it if it sets up your next load |
| Rate matches your cost | You worked for free, pass |
| Rate is below your cost | You paid to haul it, hard pass |
Put real numbers to it. Say your cost per mile works out to around 1.65 per mile and the load pays a real rate of about 2.19 per mile after deadhead. Your profit is roughly 0.54 per mile. Across 650 total miles, that is a little over 350 dollars in your pocket for the run. Now shorten the deadhead so the same load pays 2.85 per mile, and the profit jumps to about 1.20 per mile, or close to 780 dollars over 500 miles. Same freight, very different day, and the only variable that moved was the empty miles.
That thin middle row is where a lot of drivers get stuck. A load that barely clears your cost can still make sense if it drops you in a strong freight market for your next pickup. A load that barely clears your cost and strands you in a dead zone is a trap. Think one load ahead.
Do not forget the clock
Miles are only half the story. Time is the other half, and it is easy to ignore because nobody hands you a bill for it.
Two loads can pay the same rate per mile and be worlds apart once you count the days. A load that runs 500 miles and delivers the same day is very different from a load that runs 500 miles but sits two days for a live unload. The second load ties up your truck for three days doing one day of work.
The cleaner way to compare is dollars of profit per day your truck is committed:
Profit per day = Load profit / Days from pickup to delivery
| Load | Load profit | Days committed | Profit per day |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fast drop and hook | about 350 | 1 | about 350 |
| Same pay, live load with wait | about 350 | 3 | about 117 |
| Longer haul, steady run | about 600 | 2 | about 300 |
The first and second rows earn the exact same money on paper, but the truck makes roughly three times as much per day on the fast one. When you compare loads, ask what each one pays per day your truck is committed, not just per mile:
- How many days from pickup to delivery?
- Is it a drop and hook or a long live load?
- Does the appointment leave you sitting over a weekend?
A truck sitting still earns nothing while the fixed costs keep ticking. Sometimes a lower-mile load that turns fast beats a longer haul that ties you up, because you can book a second load in the same stretch of days.
Common mistakes
Even drivers who know the math slip on the same few things. Watch for these.
- Pricing on loaded miles only. The rate sheet number always looks better than reality. If you skip deadhead, you are quoting yourself a rate you will never actually earn.
- Counting money you are not sure to collect. Detention that kicks in after hours of sitting, a fuel surcharge that is really a maybe, an accessorial the broker hints at but will not put in writing. Build the price on guaranteed dollars only.
- Ignoring the clock. A great rate per mile on a load that sits three days for a live unload can lose to a plain rate that turns in a day. Always convert to profit per day before you compare.
- Not knowing your cost per mile. Without it, every rate is just a number with no meaning. You cannot tell a strong load from a losing one, so you end up booking on gut feel.
- Anchoring to an old rate. The lane that paid well last spring may be soft this month. Rates move by season, lane, and equipment, so price on today’s market, not last year’s memory.
- Chasing miles instead of profit. Running hard for a rate that barely clears your cost keeps the truck busy and the bank account flat. Empty seat time on a good load beats a full week of cheap freight.
Put it all together
When a load comes across the board, run it through the same short checklist every time:
- Get the all-in rate. Linehaul plus fuel surcharge plus sure-thing accessorials.
- Add up all the miles. Loaded plus deadhead.
- Figure the real rate per mile. All-in rate divided by total miles.
- Compare to your cost per mile. Is there room above your cost?
- Check the clock. How many days does it tie up your truck?
- Look one load ahead. Does it leave you somewhere with more freight?
Do this a few times and it becomes second nature. You will size up a load in under a minute and turn down the ones that only look good on the surface. Our load profitability calculator walks through the same steps and does the arithmetic for you, so you can price a load right from the cab before you call the broker back. When you want to see what a run really adds to your paycheck after taxes and fixed costs, run it through the take-home pay calculator too.
A few honest reminders
Freight rates move around a lot. What counts as a strong rate this month may be weak next month, and it swings by lane, season, and equipment type. Do not anchor to a number a buddy quoted you last year. Check current load-board and rate-index data for your lane before you decide what is strong.
Know your own cost per mile before you price anything else, because a rate means nothing until you hold it up against your cost. And build a cushion into every load. The goal is not to break even, it is to pay yourself, cover the surprises, and put something aside for the slow weeks that always come.
The numbers in this guide are illustrations to show the method, not quotes for your lane or your truck. Fuel prices, insurance, and market rates all change over time, so pull current figures from your own records and from official or industry sources when you price real freight. This is general guidance to help you think it through, not professional or financial advice. Your numbers are your own. Run them, trust them, and let them tell you which loads to book and which ones to wave on down the road.