Marketing Reach Frequency Calculator

Balance reach against frequency for a fixed budget and see the trade-off each choice forces.

About Marketing Reach Frequency Calculator

A fixed budget buys a fixed number of impressions, which can be spent on reaching more people or on reaching fewer people more often. The two are strictly traded against each other, and this makes the exchange rate explicit. Planning reach and frequency independently produces plans that cannot be bought; the budget constraint ties them together.

Formula

Marketing Reach Frequency

Impressions = budget ÷ CPM × 1,000; reach = impressions ÷ frequency

coverage: Reach as a share of the target audience

Worked example

With the default values below, Marketing Reach Frequency Calculator returns Reach Achievable at That Frequency of 900,000. Change any input above and every figure here is recalculated in your browser.

Inputs used

Available budgetminimum 0: 150,000
Cost per thousand impressionsminimum 0.01: 8
Desired frequencyaccepts 0.1–20 x: 3 x
Target audience sizeminimum 1: 900,000

Results

Reach Achievable at That Frequency: 900,000
Impressions the Budget Buys: 18,750,000
Share of Target Covered: 100.00%
Budget Needed for Full Coverage: $21,600.00
Frequency if the Whole Audience Is Reached: 20.83

Step by step

1Values used
2Marketing Reach Frequency
3Reach Achievable at That Frequency= 900,000
4Impressions the Budget Buys= 18,750,000
5Share of Target Covered= 100.00
6Budget Needed for Full Coverage= 21,600.00
7Frequency if the Whole Audience Is Reached= 20.83

Assumptions and limits

The result is derived only from the 4 inputs listed above. Anything not among them is not part of the calculation.
In particular, this calculator does not take inflation or tax into account.
Figures are rounded for display to 2 decimal places, so totals built from several rounded parts can differ slightly from the unrounded arithmetic.
This is an estimate for general information and not professional financial, tax or legal advice. See the full disclaimer for the limits that apply to this kind of calculator.

How these calculators are built and tested is described on the Methodology page. If a figure looks wrong, please report it.

Frequently Asked Questions

How is Marketing Reach Frequency calculated?

Impressions = budget ÷ CPM × 1,000; reach = impressions ÷ frequency A fixed budget buys a fixed number of impressions, which can be spent on reaching more people or on reaching fewer people more often. The two are strictly traded against each other, and this makes the exchange rate explicit.

Why does Marketing Reach Frequency matter?

Planning reach and frequency independently produces plans that cannot be bought; the budget constraint ties them together.

What values do I need to enter?

This calculator takes 4 inputs: Available budget, Cost per thousand impressions, Desired frequency, Target audience size. The pre-filled defaults are a realistic starting point — replace them with figures from your own environment for a result you can act on.