Dump truck hourly rate calculator: what to charge
Enter your truck's costs, your billable hours and a real cycle time. The dump truck hourly rate calculator gives the hourly rate to charge, and the same rate per load, per ton and per mile.
Defaults are an example truck, not market rates. Use your own costs and a real cycle time from a job.
HOURLY RATE TO CHARGE
$119.74
costs $95.80 an hour
- Fixed costs$20.00/h
- Fuel$24.80/h
- Maintenance$15.00/h
- Driver$36.00/h
- Profit$23.95/h
- Per load
- $119.74
- Per ton
- $5.99
- Per mile (round trip)
- $3.99
- Loads a day at this cycle
- 10
- Billable hours a month
- 200
Quote at least $119.74 an hour. Per-ton and per-load prices only hold if the cycle time does; a slow pit or a long wait at the site changes them.
Knowing your $119.74 floor makes every quote easier. Our dispatchers plan loads around your hours and home time, and you approve every job. Dispatch runs 5% of gross for one truck, and you confirm every load.
By Nathan Beck · Updated October 2026
Dump truck work gets quoted by the hour, by the load, by the ton and sometimes by the mile, and it is easy to lose money switching between them. This dump truck hourly rate calculator starts from the only number that is the same in every quote: what your truck costs you per billable hour. It adds your margin, then converts the hourly rate into per load, per ton and per mile using a real cycle time.
Start from your own costs
We do not publish typical dump truck hauling rates, because we have not found a national source we trust and local markets differ widely. Rates depend on your region, the material, the distance, the season and how busy the pits are. What you can know is your cost:
- Fixed costs: truck payment, insurance, plates and permits, spread over the hours you can bill.
- Fuel: gallons per working hour times the diesel price. The default price is the EIA U.S. average of $6.199 a gallon for the week of October 5, 2026.
- Maintenance and tires: a reserve per working hour.
- Driver: the wage, or what you pay yourself, plus payroll taxes and workers' comp.
POSTED: EIA, Gasoline and Diesel Fuel Update (week of Oct 5, 2026) · checked Oct 2026
How it is calculated
- Cost per hour: fixed costs divided by billable hours a month, plus fuel, maintenance and driver cost per hour.
- Rate per hour: cost per hour divided by one minus your margin.
- Per load: the hourly rate times one round trip's time.
- Per ton: the per-load price divided by tons per load.
- Per mile: the per-load price divided by round-trip miles.
What a good and a bad quote look like
A good quote covers your cost per hour on every basis you price in, with the cycle time checked against a real job. A bad quote takes a per-ton price that worked on a short haul and uses it on a long one, or counts hours you cannot bill. If a job's per-ton price works out under your hourly rate at a realistic cycle, it does not pay.
Recheck the numbers every few months. Fuel prices, insurance renewals and a new truck payment all move your cost per hour, and a rate that covered last year's costs can quietly stop covering this year's.
Fuel and parking are the costs that move most for dump trucks. Price a fill with the semi truck fill-up cost calculator, and if you park the truck at a yard, the truck parking cost calculator adds it up. Our guide to trucker discounts covers fuel and other savings, and truck parking capacity by state shows where overnight space is tight.
Dump work, dispatched
Our dump truck dispatch page covers how we plan pit-to-site days. We plan loads around your hours and home time, and you approve every job before it is booked. You keep the final say on rates and work. See how it works for owner operators, or apply in about two minutes.
Questions about this calculator
How much should I charge per hour for a dump truck?
At least your full cost per billable hour plus the margin you need. Add up your fixed monthly costs and divide by the hours you can actually bill, then add fuel, maintenance and driver pay per hour. Divide by one minus your margin to get the rate. Local markets vary a lot, so check what jobs near you pay, but never quote under your own cost.
How do dump truck hauling rates per ton work?
A per-ton rate pays by the weight hauled instead of the time. To set one, work out your hourly rate, multiply by the hours one round trip takes, and divide by the tons in a load. It only holds if the cycle time holds: a slow loader, a long haul or a wait at the site makes per-ton work pay less per hour.
Should I charge dump truck rates per load or per hour?
Per hour protects you from delays you cannot control, like a slow pit or a busy site. Per load or per ton can pay better when the cycle is short and steady. Many operators quote hourly for unknown jobs and per load for jobs they know well. Use the calculator to make sure each price covers the same hourly cost.
What billable hours should I use?
The hours a customer actually pays for, not the hours you are out. Travel to the first job, fueling, washing out and waiting without detention pay all eat into your day. Using honest billable hours makes your fixed costs per hour higher, which is the point: those costs have to be covered by the hours that pay.
PARK BY: PLANNED WITH YOU
Dump work planned around your hours
You approve every job, and there is no fee on days you do not haul.