Laser pricing guide
How much to charge for laser engraving: why $1 per minute misleads
"A dollar a minute" is easy to remember and quick to quote. It is also wrong for most jobs, in both directions. A laser minute costs about two cents to run. The rest of a fair price is material, your own time and profit, and none of those follow the clock on the machine.
Published 11 November 2026 · by Spool & Margin · about 5 minutes
Where "$1 a minute" comes from
It is a rule of thumb that laser owners pass to each other. Two examples from the LightBurn software forum, both read on 11 November 2026: in a January 2025 thread on what to charge for laser time, one seller says they expect at least $1.00 per minute on most jobs, with material charged separately. In a November 2024 thread about quoting 50 engraved boards, a seller in the UK is told £1 per minute.
The figure is a habit more than a calculation. So calculate it.
What a laser minute costs you
Sample settings: a $2,999 CO2 laser expected to last 6,000 hours, $0.40 per hour for maintenance, 700 W including the exhaust fan, electricity at $0.16 per kWh.
- Machine: $2,999 ÷ 6,000 h = $0.50 per hour
- Maintenance: $0.40 per hour
- Electricity: 0.7 kW × $0.16 = $0.11 per hour
- Together: $1.01 per hour, or 1.7 cents per minute
So a $1-per-minute rate is about 2% machine and 98% something else. That something else is your time, overhead and profit, and your time does not track laser minutes. Loading a blank, cleaning it and packing it take the same minutes whether the engraving runs for two minutes or thirty.
Worked example: a bamboo cutting board with a name
The blank comes from a case of 18 that cost $140.00. The engraving runs for 10 minutes. You spend 8 minutes on the order: placing the board, cleaning, checking, packing. Labor is $20 per hour, the scrap allowance is 5%, and the box and padding cost $1.00.
| Layer | Calculation | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Blank | $140.00 ÷ 18 | $7.78 |
| Machine + electricity | 10 min × $0.0169 | $0.17 |
| Labor | 8 min × $20/h | $2.67 |
| Scrap allowance | 5% × $7.95 | $0.40 |
| Packaging | $1.00 | |
| True cost | $12.01 |
Sold through a marketplace that takes 9.5% plus $0.45 per order (the US Etsy figures; sources are in our Etsy pricing guide), with a 40% target margin:
At $24.99 the fees are $2.82, the profit is $10.16 and the margin is 40.6%.
Now the rule. Ten minutes at $1 is $10.00, less than the board costs to make; that sale loses $3.41. The rule is often quoted with the material added on top, as in the first thread above: $10.00 + $7.78 = $17.78. At that price the fees are $2.14, the profit is $3.63 and the margin is 20.4%, half the target. The rule left out your 8 minutes, the packaging, the scrap and the fees.
The same rule on four products
Same laser, same labor rate, same fees. "Rule price" is $1 per laser minute plus the material at cost.
| Product | Laser minutes | Hands-on minutes | True cost | Rule price | Rule price: Margin | Price for 40% margin | That price per laser minute |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Birch ornament with a name (15 per sheet) | 2.5 | 4 | $1.98 | $2.79 | 3.3% | $4.99 | $2.00 |
| Bamboo board, name | 10 | 8 | $12.01 | $17.78 | 20.4% | $24.99 | $2.50 |
| Bamboo board, full recipe | 30 | 10 | $13.03 | $37.78 | 54.8% | $26.99 | $0.90 |
| Photo engrave on acrylic | 30 | 20 | $9.95 | $31.91 | 57.9% | $20.99 | $0.70 |
One laser, one margin target, and the per-minute price that reaches it runs from $0.70 to $2.50. The flat rate fails in two ways:
- Short jobs with handling are underpriced. The ornament earns nine cents at the rule price. Its cost is mostly the 4 minutes you spend on it, not the 2.5 minutes on the laser.
- Long, hands-off jobs are overpriced. The recipe board comes out at $37.78 when $26.99 already reaches the target. If buyers pay it, good. On a competitive quote it can lose the job.
What to charge instead
- Work out your machine cost per minute once, with the formula above.
- For each product, add material, machine time, your hands-on minutes at your labor rate, a scrap allowance and packaging.
- Add fixed selling fees and divide by (1 − target margin − fee %).
- Set a minimum order charge for small custom jobs, and add design time to the job it belongs to.
- Then divide the price by the laser minutes. That is your own per-minute figure for that kind of product, and you can use it for quick estimates of similar jobs.
We use the same method for 3D prints: see how to price 3D prints for margin against markup, and pricing custom orders for quotes by quantity.
Laser spreadsheet · $14, one-time
See what every product earns per laser minute
The laser spreadsheet does the calculation on this page for up to 200 products: true cost with sheet yield, the price that reaches your margin after fees, and what each product earns per laser minute. Also inside: a quote tab for 1 to 100 pieces, blank and sheet inventory, orders and a profit dashboard. Excel and Google Sheets.
Get the laser spreadsheet$14, one-time · Opens on Gumroad · Instant download
Questions
How much should I charge for laser engraving?
Work out the cost of one piece: material or blank, machine time, your hands-on minutes, a scrap allowance and packaging. Add any fixed selling fees, then divide by 1 minus your target margin minus your fee percentage. In the example on this page, a bamboo cutting board with a name costs $12.01 to make and needs a price of $24.99 for a 40% margin after marketplace fees.
Is $1 per minute a good price for laser engraving?
It can be right for one job and wrong for the next. With the sample numbers on this page, $1 per laser minute plus material leaves a 3.3% margin on a small ornament and 57.9% on a 30-minute photo engrave. The rate ignores your hands-on time, packaging and selling fees, which do not depend on how long the laser runs.
What does it cost to run a laser engraver per minute?
Machine price divided by its expected life in hours, plus maintenance per hour, plus electricity, divided by 60. For a $2,999 laser expected to last 6,000 hours, with $0.40 per hour of maintenance and 700 W at $0.16 per kWh, that is about $1.01 per hour, or 1.7 cents per minute. Use your own machine's figures.
Should I charge for design and setup time?
Yes. Count every minute you work on the order at your hourly labor rate: preparing the file, placing the piece, cleaning, checking and packing. For a custom job, add the design time to that job. A minimum order charge protects very small jobs.
The product figures on this page come from the sample data in the Spool & Margin laser spreadsheet. Machine life, wattage, maintenance, times and prices are example settings, not measurements of any machine. Etsy and LightBurn are trademarks of their owners; Spool & Margin is not affiliated with them. This is a calculation method, not tax or financial advice.