Bike Commute Savings Calculator

No — bike-side cost is limited to your entered annual maintenance figure (tires, tubes, chains, tune-ups), so the calculator doesn't subtract anything for the bike's purchase price, cold/wet-weather gear, or workplace shower facilities. If you're financing a new bike specifically for commuting, factor that upfront cost in separately when weighing the real payback period.

That figure is a rough stand-in for the maintenance-and-depreciation portion of the IRS standard mileage rate — tire wear, oil changes, brake wear, and the vehicle's gradual loss of value from added miles — kept deliberately separate from the fuel cost line, which is calculated independently from your MPG and fuel price. Together, fuel, parking, and this wear estimate make up your total annual car cost.

Workdays per week and weeks per year multiply together to get your total commuting days for the year, so they capture two different kinds of gaps in your commuting: workdays per week accounts for days off within a normal week, while weeks per year accounts for vacations, extended remote work, or seasons where you don't bike at all. Lowering either number reduces annual miles and therefore both your cost totals and your calories/CO2 estimates proportionally.

It's a moderate-pace approximation that applies the same rate regardless of your body weight, cycling speed, terrain, or wind — actual calorie burn for cycling varies significantly with all of those factors, and a heavier rider or a hillier route will burn meaningfully more than this flat per-mile figure suggests. Treat the calories-burned output as a ballpark motivational number rather than a precise fitness-tracking figure.