ROAS (Return on Ad Spend)
MetricROAS is the revenue generated for every unit of currency spent on advertising, expressed as a ratio or a multiple.
What is ROAS, in plain English?
Think of ROAS like a money multiplier at an arcade: if you put $1 into an ad machine and it gives you $4 in customer orders back, your ROAS is 4x. It tells you how much revenue an ad generated compared to what you paid to run it.
How do you calculate ROAS?
ROAS = Revenue Attributed to Ads ÷ Ad Spend
ROAS example
If a campaign spends $1,000 on Google Ads and generates $4,000 in tracked customer orders, the ROAS is $4,000 ÷ $1,000 = 4.0 (or "4x").
Common ROAS mistakes
ROAS only measures top-line revenue, not profit. An ad with 4x ROAS can still lose you money if your product manufacturing, shipping, and fulfillment costs consume 80% of that revenue. Additionally, Google Ads, Meta, and your CRM backend will each calculate ROAS differently because each platform takes credit for the same customer.
What is a good ROAS?
There is no universal good ROAS — it depends on your margin. Start from breakeven ROAS (1 ÷ gross margin): a 50% margin business breaks even at 2.0x, a 25% margin business at 4.0x. A good ROAS clears that floor by enough to cover fixed costs and your profit target, measured on revenue you can reconcile in your own database rather than on what one platform claims.
ROAS FAQs
What is a good ROAS?
A good ROAS is one above your breakeven ROAS, which is 1 divided by your gross margin. At a 40% margin that floor is 2.5x, so 3x is profitable — while the same 3x loses money for a business running a 25% margin, whose floor is 4x. Judge ROAS against your own margin, never against another company's number.
Is ROAS the same as ROI?
No. ROAS divides revenue by ad spend only. ROI divides profit by the total investment, after product, shipping, fees and other costs. A campaign can show a 4x ROAS and a negative ROI when margins are thin, which is why finance teams prefer contribution-margin ROAS or MER.
Why is ROAS different in Google Ads, Meta and my database?
Each ad platform counts every conversion its ads touched within its own attribution window, so two platforms can both claim the same order. Your database counts each order once. Summed platform ROAS therefore overstates real returns; reconcile against blended figures from your own orders.
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Last reviewed October 3, 2026.