Art Pricing Calculator – Free Tool to Price Paintings and Prints

Our free art pricing calculator shows you how to price art with four common methods: price per square inch, width plus height, and hours plus materials, or all three side by side. Enter the size, medium, and your costs, and you get a recommended price, a range to test, what you keep after a gallery commission, and print prices for an edition. A price list for several sizes can be copied, saved as a CSV file, or printed as a PDF, and everything stays in your browser.

How to Use the Art Pricing Calculator

It takes about a minute:

1. Pick a method. The tabs at the top switch between “Per sq in”, “Width + height”, “Hours + materials”, and “Compare all”.
2. Describe the artwork. Choose inches or centimeters and your currency ($, €, £, or CHF), then enter the width and height and pick the medium.
3. Set your rates. Choose Beginner, Emerging, or Established to fill in starting rates, then change them to match your own sales.
4. Add your costs. Enter materials, frame, and shipping. Leave materials or hours empty, and the calculator uses the estimate shown in the field.
5. Add selling details. Set a gallery commission from 0% to 60%, an optional sales tax or VAT, and how far the price should be rounded up.
6. Use the results. Read the recommended price and the breakdown, build a price list for several sizes, price your prints, and copy a share link that brings back all your values.

The Four Pricing Methods

Most pricing advice comes down to three simple formulas. Our guide on how to price your art explains the thinking behind them in more detail.

Price per Square Inch

The width is multiplied by the height, and the area is multiplied by your rate per square inch (or per square centimeter when you switch to cm). The medium adds a factor: oil counts in full, acrylic at 0.9, watercolor at 0.75, drawing at 0.6, digital at 0.5, and a print or edition at 0.35. Materials and the frame are added on top. A 16 x 20 inch oil painting at $2.50 per square inch gives 320 x $2.50 = $800 before costs.

It keeps a series consistent, but very large work can end up priced above what your market will pay.

Width + Height (Linear Inch)

Here the width and the height are added, and the sum is multiplied by your rate per linear inch, again with the medium factor. A 16 x 20 inch painting at $22 per linear inch gives 36 x $22 = $792 before costs. Because the sum grows more slowly than the area, large pieces end up cheaper per square inch than with the first method.

Hours + Materials

This method starts from your time: hours spent multiplied by your hourly rate, plus materials and the frame. If you leave the hours empty, the calculator estimates them from the size and medium, from 0.02 hours per square inch for a print to 0.05 for an oil painting, rounded to half hours and at least one hour. Time-based pricing suits commissions and slow, detailed work. See what art commissions are for what else to agree on with a client.

Compare All

The comparison tab runs all three methods with your values and shows them as bars. The recommended price is the middle value of the three, and the breakdown shows which method produced it. If the highest and lowest result differ by more than 50%, a note suggests checking your rates and hours.

What Each Setting Does

• Units: inches or centimeters. Switching converts the size, the rates, and the size lists, so the price stays about the same (sizes and rates are rounded slightly when converted).
• Currency: $, €, £, or CHF. Only the symbol changes, so set rates that fit your market.
• Medium: sets the size factor and the estimates for materials and hours. Materials are estimated from $0.03 per square inch for digital work to $0.12 for oil.
• Experience: fills in starting rates. Beginner uses $1 per square inch, $9 per linear inch, and $20 per hour. Emerging uses $2.50, $22, and $35. Established uses $5, $45, and $60. They are not converted between currencies.
• Frame and shipping: the frame is part of the price. Shipping can be paid by the buyer on top, or included in the price.
• Gallery commission: 0% to 60% in steps of 5%. “Add on top” raises the price so you still receive your full amount. “Take from price” keeps the price, and the gallery’s share comes out of it.
• Sales tax / VAT: adds the rate you enter to the price of the artwork and shows what the buyer pays. It does not decide whether you have to charge tax.
• Round up to: “Auto” rounds up to the next 5 below 250, the next 25 below 1,000, the next 50 below 5,000, and the next 100 above that. You can also choose a fixed step of 5, 10, 25, 50, or 100, or no rounding.

What the Results Mean

The recommended price is your formula plus costs, plus the commission if you add it on top, rounded up. The range to test repeats the calculation with your rate 20% lower and higher, while your costs stay the same. The boxes show what you keep after the commission, your profit after costs, your profit per hour of work, what the buyer pays, and the break-even price, the lowest price that still covers your costs and the commission. A breakdown below lists every step, so you can check the math line by line.

Price List for Several Sizes

Type the sizes you work in, for example 8×10, 11×14, 16×20, 24×36, and the calculator prices all of them at once with the current method, up to 20 sizes. Materials and hours grow with the area, and the frame cost grows with the perimeter. If you are planning a series, our list of standard canvas sizes helps you choose formats.

“Copy table” copies the list so you can paste it into a spreadsheet. “Download CSV” saves it as a file, and “Print or save PDF” opens a clean price sheet with your settings and both tables. Choose “Save as PDF” in the print dialog to keep a file.

Pricing Prints and Editions

The prints section prices reproductions of your work. Enter the edition size (0 for an open edition), your print cost per square inch, and the print sizes. A print is priced at a share of your original’s price per square inch: 6% for an open edition, 8% for 250 prints or more, 10% from 100, 12% from 50, 15% from 26, and 20% for 25 or fewer. The price is never lower than 2.5 times the print cost, and the table shows which rule set it.

These shares are a rule of thumb built into the tool, not an industry standard. For a limited edition, the table also shows the value of the whole edition. Our guides to making and selling prints of your art and to the giclée print explain production and quality, and printmaking techniques covers original prints such as etchings and screen prints.

How the Calculator Works

For the size methods, the price before commission is the size part (area or width plus height, times your rate and the medium factor) plus materials, frame, and any shipping you include. For the time method, it is hours times your hourly rate plus the same costs. With “Add on top”, this sum is divided by one minus the commission, so with 50% it doubles. Then the price is rounded up.

Here is an example. A 16 x 20 inch oil painting at the Emerging rate of $2.50 per square inch gives $800. The estimated materials of $38.40 bring it to $838.40. With a 50% commission added on top, the price becomes $1,676.80, which rounds up to $1,700. The gallery receives $850, and you keep $850, or $811.60 after materials.

The share link stores your values after the # sign in the address, a part of the link that browsers do not send to the server.

Tips for Pricing Your Art

• Stay consistent. Charge the same price for a piece in your studio, online, and in a gallery.
• Raise prices slowly. When most of your work sells, move your rate up in modest steps.
• Never sell below break-even. If a discount brings the price below the break-even value, you pay to sell the piece.
• Look at your market. Compare your prices with artists at a similar stage, in the same medium, size, and region.
• Pricing is not appraising. To value an older piece, see how to find the value of a painting.

Who the Calculator Is For

Painters and illustrators use it to price work for a show, an online shop, or an art fair. Artists who take commissions can quote by the hour and check the result against a size-based price, and digital artists can price originals and prints (see how to sell digital art). New to selling? Read how to start an art business.

Privacy and Honest Limits

The calculator runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you type is uploaded or stored, and there is no sign-up, no limit, and no watermark on the price sheet.

The results are starting points from common formulas, not an appraisal or tax, legal, or financial advice. Adjust the starting rates and medium factors to your own work and market.

More Free Art Tools

All our tools are free, run in your browser, and need no account. See them all on the free art tools page.

• Art prompt generator: get random ideas for drawing and painting.
• Random character generator: create an original character with traits and a palette.
• Image color picker: find the exact colors in any photo or painting.
• Color name finder: get the name of any HEX, RGB, or photo color.
• Color wheel: find complementary, triadic, and analogous colors.
• Color mixer: mix paint or screen colors and find paint recipes.
• Color palette generator: create matching color schemes or a palette from an image.
• Color blindness simulator: see images and palettes as color blind people do.
• Photo to sketch: turn a photo into a pencil sketch or line art.
• Photo to coloring page: turn any picture into a printable coloring page.
• Image to pixel art: convert an image into editable pixel art.
• Notan generator: plan light and dark shapes with a two- or three-value study.
• Art grid tool: put a drawing grid over any photo.
• Golden ratio overlay: check your composition with a golden spiral and rule of thirds.
• Perspective grid generator: print one-, two-, and three-point perspective grids.
• Paint by number generator: turn a photo into a printable paint by number template.

Frequently Asked Questions

How Do I Price My Art as a Beginner?

Use a simple formula with a low rate, add your material costs, and compare the result with artists at a similar stage. Choose “Beginner” in the calculator for starting rates, and raise them as your work sells.

What Is the Formula for Pricing Art?

The most common formulas are width x height x a rate per square inch, (width + height) x a rate per linear inch, and hours x hourly rate. Each one adds the cost of materials and the frame. The calculator shows all three and their middle value.

How Much Should I Charge per Square Inch?

There is no fixed rate, because it depends on your medium, experience, and market. The calculator starts at $1 per square inch for beginners, $2.50 for emerging artists, and $5 for established artists, and you can set any rate you like.

How Much Commission Does a Gallery Take?

Gallery commissions often fall between 30% and 50%, a 50/50 split is common, and some galleries take more, so check your contract. Our article on what an art gallery does explains how galleries work. The calculator accepts up to 60% and shows what you keep.

How Should I Price Art Prints?

Prints sell well below the original but must cover printing with a clear margin. The calculator prices them as a share of the original’s price per square inch, higher for small limited editions, and never below 2.5 times the print cost.

Should I Include the Frame in the Price?

If you sell the piece framed, yes. Add the frame cost in the calculator, and it becomes part of the price and of any commission.

Is the Art Pricing Calculator Free?

Yes. It is completely free, needs no account, and works in inches or centimeters with dollars, euros, pounds, or Swiss francs.