Trade Fee Calculator
Calculate your net profit or loss after accounting for broker commissions.
Fee Structure
Estimates only. Actual fees vary by broker. Always check your broker's current fee schedule.
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Frequently Asked Questions
How do trading fees affect day trading profitability?
Fees are deducted from every round trip (buy + sell), raising your effective breakeven on each trade. A $5 flat commission on a 500-share trade in a $50 stock ($25,000 position) means the stock must move $0.01/share before you break even.
Active traders doing 10 round trips daily at $5/trade pay $50/day, $1,000/month, and $12,000/year in commissions alone — before the stock moves a penny. This calculator shows cumulative fee drag at your actual frequency so you can assess the true cost of your trading style.
What are the three main broker fee structures for stock trading?
Flat per-trade fee: a fixed dollar amount regardless of share count ($0–$6.95/trade), common at Fidelity, Schwab, and E*TRADE's standard accounts.
Per-share fee: a rate per share traded ($0.0035–$0.005/share), common at direct-access brokers like Interactive Brokers and Cobra Trading — economical for large orders, expensive for small share counts.
Commission-free with payment for order flow (PFOF): advertised as $0 but brokers receive payment from market makers, which may result in wider spreads or inferior fills — effectively a hidden fee on larger or less-liquid trades.
At what share count does per-share pricing beat flat-fee pricing?
The crossover point = Flat Fee ÷ Per-Share Round-Trip Rate. At $1 flat vs. $0.005/share per side ($0.01 round-trip): crossover = 100 shares. Below 100 shares, flat-fee wins; above 100 shares, per-share wins. At $5 flat vs. $0.005/share round-trip: crossover = 500 shares.
Most high-volume day traders executing 500–5,000 share orders pay significantly less with per-share pricing. The calculator uses your inputs to show the exact fee impact so you can evaluate which structure costs less at your typical trade size.
How do you calculate the breakeven price movement needed to cover trading fees?
Breakeven per share = Round-trip Fee ÷ Number of Shares.
For a $1 round-trip fee on 200 shares: $0.005/share breakeven. For a per-share rate of $0.005 each way on 200 shares: round-trip = $2.00, breakeven = $0.01/share. For a 0.1% of trade value structure on 200 shares at $50 ($10,000 position): round-trip fee = $20, breakeven = $0.10/share.
Every trade must move past this threshold just to reach zero — any profit comes only from movement beyond the breakeven.
Do zero-commission brokers actually cost nothing to trade?
Not entirely. Zero-commission retail brokers route orders through market makers who pay for that flow (PFOF). Retail traders may receive wider bid-ask spreads or less price improvement versus a direct-access broker with explicit per-share fees.
For active traders executing large orders in liquid stocks, the cost of PFOF-based execution can exceed what a $0.005/share direct-access fee would cost. For frequent day traders, per-share pricing with best-execution routing often produces better net results despite the visible commission charge.
How do I calculate my total annual trading cost including non-commission fees?
Annual commission = Round-trip fee × Daily trades × Trading days/month × 12. Enter these values above to see the commission component instantly.
Beyond commissions, active traders also pay SEC fees ($8.00 per $1M in sale proceeds, charged on sells only), FINRA TAF ($0.000166/share sold, max $8.30/trade), and platform or data subscription fees ($50–$300/month for professional scanners and Level 2 data). Add fixed monthly platform costs separately from the per-trade commission math.