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Apprentice Cost CalculatorWhat an apprentice really costs, once you price the supervision nobody prices.

The all-in cost of an apprentice for an Australian or New Zealand trade business. Wages and on-costs, the weeks they are at trade school, the on-site hours that never reach an invoice, and the supervision time that pulls a qualified tradesperson off their own work. Put your own figures in and it returns what one billable hour of their work actually costs you. Everything is worked out in your browser and nothing you type is sent anywhere.

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A painted scene of Australian trade business owners going over their numbers together in warm golden hour light

Why the wage is not the number

Sound Familiar?

The wage looked affordable, so you stopped there

You put their hourly rate next to a qualified tradesperson's and it looked like the obvious answer to being flat out. Nobody sat you down and added the super, the workers comp, the allowances, the leave, the weeks at trade school or the hours of your best bloke it was about to cost you.

Nobody warned you how many weeks they are not there

Block release, TAFE, whatever your state calls it. You pay them for those weeks and they are not on a job in a single one of them. Then there are the on-site hours spent learning rather than earning, sweeping up, and going back for the fitting that was wrong. Every one of those hours is paid for and none of them reaches an invoice.

Your best tradesperson quietly got slower

This is the one that never shows up as a cost. The qualified bloke who used to knock over a job a day now does most of one, because he is showing someone, checking behind them, and occasionally doing it again after hours. That is not a training expense on any report. It is an invoice you never raised.

An apprentice never arrives as a loss on a report. They arrive as a good kid you like having around, a crew that is somehow busier than ever, and a quarter that does not add up, and it can stay that way for the full four years.

The calculator

Work Out What An Apprentice Actually Costs You.

Ten numbers, and you have most of them already. The only one worth looking up is the award rate, and we tell you where. Change anything and the answer moves as you type. It all happens in your browser, so nothing you put in here goes anywhere.

What you pay them

Step 1

What you pay them

The part everybody already knows, and the smallest part of the answer.

Before super and on-costs. Apprentice rates are graduated percentages that depend on your award, their stage and the year, so get the real one from the Fair Work pay guide for your own award. We will not guess it for you, because a guess here makes every number below wrong.

Superannuation, workers compensation, allowances and leave loading, as a percentage on top of the wage. Your bookkeeper can give you the real figure in about a minute, and it is the same percentage question as for anyone else on the crew.

What you pay for, not what gets invoiced. Thirty eight is the ordinary full-time week.

Hours you pay for and hours you can bill

Step 2

Hours you pay for and hours you can bill

Trade school and learning time are paid for and invoiced to nobody. This is where an apprentice stops looking cheap.

Fifty two, less annual leave, public holidays and the days they are sick. Forty six is a normal answer once you take all three out.

Block release, TAFE, whatever your state calls it. You pay them for these weeks and they are not on a job in any of them, which is the first cost every incentive page leaves out. Check the training plan for the real number.

Of the hours they are actually on a job, how many end up on a customer invoice. Take out travel, cleaning up, running for materials, yard time and the jobs they were learning on rather than earning on. First years land a long way below a qualified tradesperson.

What supervising them costs you

Step 3

What supervising them costs you

The cost that never appears on a payslip and decides the whole question.

Hours a week a qualified person spends showing them, checking behind them and occasionally doing it again. Be honest, and count the first six months properly. This is the cost that decides whether an apprentice pays for themselves.

Not their wage. Their charge-out rate, because an hour spent supervising is an hour the business could have invoiced and did not. If you do not know it, work it out with the charge-out rate calculator first and come back.

Do not know that rate? Work it out with the charge-out rate calculator and bring the number back. The figure it starts with here is the one that calculator returns from its own example figures, so the two tools agree rather than each guessing.

What comes back off, and what they bring in

Step 4

What comes back off, and what they bring in

Incentives are real. They are also smaller than the supervision bill, which is why the maths has to be done in this order.

Per year, and only what you have actually been told you qualify for. Employer incentives, wage subsidies and any state payroll tax rebate. Eligibility depends on the qualification, your location and the year, so check apprenticeships.gov.au or your Australian Apprenticeship Support Network rather than assuming. It starts at nought on purpose.

Optional. Put in what you bill an apprentice hour at and the result shows whether they are carrying themselves or being carried, and by how much across a year.

The figures it starts with are round examples so the tool works the moment you land. They are not award rates and not a benchmark. Replace every one of them with your own.

The working

Wage only, per year
$34,960
On-costs on top
$8,740
What payroll thinks they cost
$43,700
Paid hours a year
1,748
Weeks on a job, after trade school
41
Hours you can invoice
935
Paid hours nobody invoices
813
Qualified hours spent supervising
246
What that supervision costs
$35,424
Cost before incentives
$79,124
All-in cost, after incentives
$79,124
Rate their hours must be charged at to break even
$85

Supervision is priced at the qualified person's charge-out rate, not their wage, because the hour they lose is an hour the business could have invoiced. It is counted on weeks the apprentice is on a job, not weeks they are at trade school. Every figure here is worked out in your browser. Nothing you type is sent anywhere, stored or logged.

The formula

The True Apprentice Cost, Step By Step.

This is what the calculator is doing. Work it on paper if you would rather, or use it to check a figure a broker or a support network has given you.

Step 1

Start with the wage, and get the real one

Apprentice minimum rates are graduated percentages that depend on your award, the stage of the apprenticeship and the year, so look yours up in the Fair Work pay guide for your own award rather than working off what someone told you at the wholesaler. Multiply the hourly rate by the paid hours in a week and the weeks a year you pay them.

Step 2

Add the on-costs, because a wage is not a cost

Superannuation, workers compensation, allowances and leave loading all sit on top of the wage, and they are the same percentage question for an apprentice as for anyone else on the crew. Your bookkeeper can give you the real figure for your business in about a minute. This total is what payroll thinks an apprentice costs, and it is the last point at which the number is comfortable.

Step 3

Take out the weeks they are not on a job at all

An apprentice is paid for the weeks they spend at trade school and they are not on site in any of them. Subtract those weeks to get the weeks they are actually available to work. Nothing about this reduces what you pay. It reduces what you can invoice, which is the half of the equation every incentive page ignores.

Step 4

Take out the on-site hours that never reach an invoice

Of the hours they are on a job, only some end up on a customer invoice. Take out travel, cleaning up, running for materials, yard time, and the jobs where they were learning rather than earning. A first year lands a long way below a qualified tradesperson here, and the gap closes slowly.

Step 5

Price the supervision at a charge-out rate, not a wage

Count the hours a week a qualified person spends showing them, checking behind them and redoing things, and multiply by that person's charge-out rate rather than their wage. The business does not lose their wage when they stop to supervise, because the wage is paid either way. It loses the hour it could have invoiced. This is the cost that decides the answer, and the only one that appears on no report anywhere.

Step 6

Take off only the incentives you have actually been approved for

Employer incentives, wage subsidies and any state payroll tax rebate come off the total, and they are real money. They are also conditional on the qualification, your location and the year, so use the figure you have been told you qualify for rather than a headline amount from a brochure. If you have not checked yet, leave it at nought and find out before you commit.

Step 7

Divide by the hours you can invoice

All-in cost divided by billable hours gives you the true cost of one hour of an apprentice's work, which is the only figure that can be compared with what you charge for it. Divide by paid hours instead and you get a payroll number that treats trade school as productive and supervision as free, which is how an apprentice comes to look cheap for a year and a half.

Worked through, end to end

An apprentice on $20 an hour, paid for 38 hours a week across 46 weeks, earns $34,960. Add 25 per cent on-costs and payroll says they cost $43,700. That is the number most owners decide on, and it is the last comfortable figure on this page.

Take out 5 weeks at trade school and they are on a job for 41 weeks, or 1,558 hours. At 60 per cent of those hours reaching an invoice, only 935 hours a year can be charged to anybody, which leaves 813 paid hours to be carried by the ones that can.

Now the part nobody counts. At 6 hours of supervision a week across those on-site weeks, a qualified person spends 246 hours off their own work. Priced at $144 an hour, which is what the charge-out rate calculator returns from its own example figures, that supervision costs $35,424, or 44.8% of the total. It is a cost of the same order as the apprentice's own wage, and it appears on no report anywhere.

So the all-in cost is $79,124 before any incentive, and across 935 billable hours that is $85 an hour, against the $25.00 an hour the wage and on-costs alone suggest. Roughly 3.4 times. Their hours have to be charged at $85 just to break even. Those are round example figures, not award rates and not a benchmark. Put your own in above.

Worth knowing

What The Regulators Actually Require.

Apprentice minimum pay under the Building and Construction Award is set as graduated percentages that step up with the stage of the apprenticeship, so the cost of the same apprentice changes during the time they are with you.
Source: Fair Work Ombudsman, apprentice pay under the Building and Construction Award
Australian employers must pay superannuation guarantee contributions on ordinary time earnings for eligible employees, apprentices included, so an apprentice wage is never the full cost of an hour of their labour.
Source: Australian Taxation Office, super for employees
Financial supports for employers of Australian apprentices are conditional on things like the qualification and the employer, and the settings were reset from 1 January 2026, so an amount cannot be assumed before it is checked.
Source: Australian Apprenticeships, financial supports continuing from 1 January 2026
Apprenticeship wage subsidies and hiring incentives are administered as separate programs, each with its own eligibility rules, rather than as a single payment every employer receives.
Source: business.gov.au, apprenticeship wage subsidies and hiring incentives

What to do with the number

Knowing The Cost Is Not The Same As Affording It.

The number tells you what an apprentice costs. It does not tell you how to get them productive faster, how to cut the supervision load without cutting the quality, or how to price the work so a growing crew pays for itself. That is the part we do.

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The other half

You Need Both Numbers.

Free tool, no sign-up

Charge-out rate calculator

This page tells you what an apprentice hour costs. That one tells you what an hour has to be sold for. You need the charge-out rate to price the supervision on this page honestly, and you need the apprentice cost to know whether a growing crew is paying for itself. Same rules: it runs in your browser and nothing you type is sent anywhere.

Work out your rate

Your trade

Hiring And Team, In Your Trade.

The arithmetic on this page is the same in every trade. What is not the same is the award you are under, what a first year is allowed to do unsupervised, and how long it takes them to be worth charging out, so each of these is written for one trade.

Electricians

Hiring and team

Plumbers

Hiring and team

Builders

Hiring and team

Carpenters

Hiring and team

HVAC Technicians

Hiring and team

Roofers

Hiring and team

Landscapers

Hiring and team

Painters

Hiring and team

Tilers

Hiring and team

Concreters

Hiring and team

Solar Installers

Hiring and team

Plasterers

Hiring and team

All twelve trades, and the seven ways we help each one

Questions

Apprentice Costs, Answered.

How much does it cost to hire an apprentice in Australia?
Far more than the wage, and the honest answer is that it depends on four things you can work out in about five minutes. Take the apprentice wage for your award and their stage, add your on-costs for superannuation, workers compensation, allowances and leave loading, then work out how many hours you can actually invoice after the weeks they spend at trade school and the on-site hours that go on learning, travel and cleaning up. Then add the supervision: the hours a week a qualified person spends off their own work, priced at that person's charge-out rate rather than their wage. Finally take off only the incentives you have been told you qualify for. The calculator on this page does all of it from your own figures, and on any realistic set of inputs the cost of a billable apprentice hour lands at several times the hourly wage.
What is the real cost of supervising an apprentice?
It is usually the largest single component and it appears on no report anywhere, which is why almost nobody has a number for it. The correct way to price it is not the supervisor's wage, because you pay that whether they are supervising or working. It is their charge-out rate, because the hour they spend checking an apprentice's work is an hour the business could have put on an invoice and did not. Count the hours honestly, count the first six months properly rather than averaging them away, and put both into the calculator above. On the example figures on this page, supervision alone comes to a little under half of what an apprentice costs before any incentive comes off.
How much do apprentices get paid under the Building and Construction Award?
Apprentice minimum rates under that award are set as graduated percentages that step up with the stage of the apprenticeship, and they are reviewed, so there is no single figure that stays true and no figure at all that is true for every apprentice. We deliberately do not print one here, because the wrong rate makes every number below it wrong. Go to the Fair Work Ombudsman pay guide for your own award, find the stage your apprentice is at, and bring that hourly rate back to the calculator above. That is the one number on this page we will not guess for you.
What incentives do employers get for hiring an apprentice?
Employer incentives and wage subsidies do exist and they are worth checking properly, but they are administered as separate programs with their own eligibility rules rather than as one payment every employer receives, and the settings were reset from 1 January 2026. Whether you get anything, and how much, depends on things like the qualification, where you are and when you start. So we do not print an amount: check apprenticeships.gov.au or talk to your Australian Apprenticeship Support Network, get the figure that applies to you, and put that into the calculator. It starts at nought on purpose, because nought is the honest default for a number that depends on an assessment this page cannot make for you.
Can a sole trader hire an apprentice?
Yes. A sole trader with an ABN can employ an apprentice, and doing so makes you an employer with all of the obligations that carries: paying at least the award rate for their stage, paying superannuation on their ordinary time earnings, holding workers compensation cover, meeting your work health and safety duties, and signing a training contract with them and the registered training organisation. What changes when you are a sole trader is not whether you are allowed to, it is how much the supervision costs you, and it costs you more than it costs anyone else. In a larger business a supervised hour comes off somebody's output. In a one-person business it comes off yours, and you are the only person who can invoice at a qualified rate. That is why a sole trader should put their own charge-out rate into the supervision field above and take the answer seriously. It is often the difference between an apprentice being a good decision and being a very expensive one taken in a busy month.
Do apprentice wages attract payroll tax?
Payroll tax is a state and territory tax, so the answer depends on where you are, and several jurisdictions treat apprentice and trainee wages differently from ordinary wages through an exemption or a rebate. Most small trade businesses sit under the payroll tax threshold entirely and never encounter it. Because the thresholds, the rates and the apprentice concessions all differ by state and are reviewed, we do not publish them here. Check your own state revenue office, and if you do receive a rebate, add it to the incentives field in the calculator above so the all-in cost reflects it.
Does an apprentice ever pay for themselves?
Frequently yes, and the point of working the number out is to know when rather than to hope. Put what you charge for their hours into the last field and the calculator shows you whether their billable hours cover their all-in cost or whether the business is funding the difference. Two things move that answer more than anything else: the share of their on-site hours that reaches an invoice, which rises as they get competent, and the supervision load, which falls. An apprentice who is being carried in year one and contributing by year three is a normal and sound outcome. An apprentice being carried in year three, or being carried in year one by a business that did not know it, is the situation this calculator exists to surface before it becomes four years long.
Do my figures get sent anywhere?
No. The whole calculation runs in your browser. Nothing you type is stored, logged, transmitted or emailed to anyone, there is nothing to sign up for to see the result, and you can close the page and it is gone. That matters more here than on most calculators, because what you are typing in is somebody's wage and an honest judgement about how much supervision a named person on your crew needs. If you want to keep the numbers, write them down or screenshot the working panel.

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