Free tool
Mechanic hourly rate calculator (UK)
Work out the hourly labour rate your garage needs to charge to cover mechanic wages and overheads and still make a profit. Enter your numbers below.
Your labour rate
The break-even rate covers wages and overheads only — charge that and you make nothing. The recommended rate adds your target margin on top. “Annual cost per mechanic” should be the fully-loaded cost (wage + NI + pension), and billable hours are the hours you actually invoice, not the hours they’re on site. A guide, not advice.
Not sure what to charge? See typical UK garage labour rates by region for 2026 →
Embed this calculator on your site
Free to use on your own site — the calculator keeps a small credit link back to Garage Desk. Paste this where you want it to appear.
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style="border:0;max-width:900px;width:100%"></iframe>How the labour rate is worked out
Your charge-out rate has to recover everything it costs to run the workshop, not just the mechanic’s wage. Add your wages, your overheads — rent, tools, insurance, software, utilities — and the profit you want, then spread that across the hours you can actually bill. The result is the hourly rate that keeps the garage profitable. Once you have a figure, put it on every job with our free invoice generator or check it against typical UK labour rates by region.
FAQ
Questions people ask
Add up your mechanic wages, your workshop overheads and the profit margin you want, then divide by the billable hours you actually sell. This calculator does that maths from your own numbers.