Model the full monthly cost of your AI tool stack. Enter each tool, seats and usage tier to see total AI spend, cost per employee and whether your stack delivers value for money.
AI tools in your stack (enter monthly cost per seat and seats used):
The average UK knowledge worker now has access to 3-5 AI tools, but most organisations lack visibility into total AI spend or whether the combined cost is justified by productivity gains. A 20-person team spending £1,800/month on AI tools needs each employee to save just 2 hours/week to break even. Understanding this break-even calculation — and tracking actual adoption — is the foundation of responsible AI investment.
| Tool Type | Typical Cost | Best For | Avg Time Saved |
|---|---|---|---|
| General AI Assistant (ChatGPT, Claude) | £15–£30/seat/mo | Writing, research, coding, analysis | 2–5 hrs/week |
| Microsoft 365 Copilot | £27–£30/seat/mo | Office suite integration, emails | 1–3 hrs/week |
| AI Coding Assistant (Copilot, Cursor) | £10–£20/seat/mo | Developers, technical teams | 5–15 hrs/week |
| Meeting AI (Otter, Fireflies) | £8–£20/seat/mo | Teams with frequent meetings | 0.5–2 hrs/week |
| AI Design (Midjourney, Adobe Firefly) | £8–£60/seat/mo | Marketing, design teams | 2–8 hrs/week |
AI tool spend benchmarks: 0.5-2% of payroll is typical for most businesses in 2026. A 20-person team with £800K payroll: £4,000-£16,000/year AI budget (£17-67/employee/month). The right level depends on how AI-intensive the work is. Software teams and content-heavy roles warrant higher spend; manual, physical roles warrant lower. The key metric is whether AI spend is less than 50% of the productivity value generated.
Highest ROI AI tools based on cost vs time saved: (1) General AI assistants (ChatGPT Plus/Claude Pro at £15-20/month) — highest ROI for knowledge workers; (2) AI coding assistants (Copilot at £10-19/month) — exceptional ROI for developers; (3) AI meeting tools (£8-15/month) — strong ROI for meeting-heavy roles; (4) AI writing tools (Grammarly, Jasper) — good ROI for content-heavy roles. Measure actual time saved quarterly to validate ongoing investment.