Deadhead miles cost calculator

Empty miles are never free

Deadhead miles are the miles a truck drives empty, most often to reach the next pickup. They burn fuel, wear tires and brakes, and use driving hours, but no load pays for them directly. A posting that pays well per loaded mile can turn ordinary once you count the 150 empty miles needed to reach it.

This deadhead miles cost calculator puts two numbers on those empty miles. The first is the out-of-pocket cost: fuel and wear. The second is what they do to the rate: how far they pull the load's rate per mile down once every mile driven is counted. Both matter when you compare two loads, or decide whether a closer, lower-paying load is the better choice.

How deadhead cost is calculated

Fuel for the empty miles is the miles divided by your mpg, times the fuel price. Wear is the empty miles times your maintenance and tire cost per mile. Add them for the out-of-pocket cost. Then the rate: the load's rate divided by its loaded miles gives the rate per loaded mile, the way most postings read. The same rate divided by loaded plus empty miles is the all-in rate. The difference is what the empty miles cost you per mile.

Fixed costs, like the truck payment and insurance, aren't counted here, because they run whether a mile is empty or loaded. They still matter for whether the load pays overall, which the trucking cost per mile calculator covers.

• EXAMPLE

  EXAMPLE LOAD

  150 empty miles to a $1,500, 600-mile load

  At 6.5 mpg and an EXAMPLE $4.00 a gallon, the empty miles burn about $92 in fuel. At 25 cents a mile for wear, add about $38. The deadhead costs about $130 out of pocket. The load reads $2.50 per loaded mile, but over all 750 miles it pays $2.00. The empty miles cost 50 cents on every mile and make up a fifth of the trip.

Reading your result

• +The all-in rate still clears your floor. The deadhead is part of the cost of doing business on this load. Fine to take.
• +The all-in rate falls under your floor. Counter, and use the empty miles as the reason. Brokers expect it.
• +Empty miles are a large share of the trip. Compare with a closer load. A lower rate with fewer empty miles can leave more money.

A little deadhead is normal. Few loads start where your last one ended. The question is whether the rate pays for them. For more on what counts as deadhead and how carriers keep it down, read our guide on what deadhead means in trucking.

When a cheap load beats driving empty

Sometimes the best answer to a long deadhead is a short, low-paying load in the same direction. It earns something for miles you'd otherwise drive empty. The way to judge that is over two loads, not one: the cheap load plus the reload it gets you to, against driving empty to the same reload. Our guide on cheap loads to reposition walks through the math.

The same thinking works in reverse. Before accepting a load into a quiet area, look at what moves out of it. A strong rate into a market with no freight can leave you with a long deadhead on the other end, and that cost belongs to the first load, even though you pay it a day later.

How a dispatcher cuts deadhead

The biggest cause of long deadhead is searching for the next load after the truck is empty. By then, the good loads near the delivery are often gone. Our dispatchers look for the reload while the truck is still loaded, weigh the empty miles on every option, and check what moves out of a delivery area before booking into it. You still decide on every load, and the rate confirmation goes to you, not to us.

See how we reduce deadhead miles, or how we work with owner-operators. For the fuel on a whole trip, use the trip fuel cost calculator. Our guide to rates per mile explains why the all-in rate is the one to watch.