Yearly car cost
Enter km per year, consumption and fuel price, plus tax, insurance and maintenance: find out how much your car really costs.
What it's for
A car costs far more than just fuel: adding fuel, tax, insurance and maintenance reveals the real spend, per year, per month and for every km driven.
Tip
The cost per km is handy to see what each trip really costs and to compare the car with other transport.
The item almost nobody counts
The biggest cost of a car is not fuel, it is depreciation: a new car typically loses 20-25% of its value in the first year and about half in three. On a €25,000 car that is €4,000-5,000 a year, more than fuel, tax and insurance put together.
It is a cost that never passes through your bank account, which is why it stays invisible: you meet it all at once on the day you sell. Buying a three or four year old car leaves the most expensive part of that curve behind you.
Cost per kilometre tells the truth
Adding up the year's items and dividing by the kilometres driven is the only way to compare the car with the train, car sharing or a taxi. At 10,000 km a year the fixed costs (tax, insurance, parking) weigh enormously; at 30,000 they thin out and fuel takes over.
It is also the number that settles the question «is it worth driving 40 km further for cheaper fuel»: if the cost per km is €0.35, those 40 km cost €14, and the saving on a tank rarely covers it. Fuel is only one piece of the cost of moving.
The expenses that arrive in waves
Tyres, services and inspections do not come every year, which is exactly why they wreck a budget: four tyres last three or four years but are paid for all at once, and a timing belt comes round once and weighs as much as six months of fuel.
The honest way to count them is to spread them across the year: if tyres cost €600 and last 40,000 km, that is 1.5 cents per kilometre. The same goes for the battery, the clutch and the inspection: they are certain expenses, just not annual ones.
Nearby tools
The individual items are worked out with Car tax calculator and Power surtax calculator. If you are weighing up a move to electric, the clean comparison is in Electric or petrol: cost per km.