Portrait photographer pricing calculator
What should I charge?
A personalised pricing calculator for portrait photographers
Where are you based?
We’ll pre-fill typical living costs for your area. You can adjust any figure on the next page.
(Not sure? Pick a country or city with a similar cost of living to yours.)
Your monthly living costs
A professional business should pay its owner properly. This is your goal, not just survival.
Your monthly business costs
Packaging, processing fees, client hospitality, and anything else
How you work
This is your goal — not necessarily where you are now.
Where you are now
Portrait photography only — not weddings, commercial, or events. Total spend per client including session fee.
Your pricing picture
Before you look at the numbers
Around 95% of photographers are shoot-and-burn — they hand over all the files for a flat fee and move on. That’s not your competition. Don’t price against them.
These numbers are built around what you need — your economy, your costs, your life. That’s the only comparison that matters.
What your monthly revenue needs to cover
This isn’t optional. It’s the minimum needed to run a sustainable, independent portrait business.
Recommended pricing
Prices shown don’t include production costs — printing, mounting, framing, folio boxes, packaging, or retouching. Know your costs. Don’t let them set your prices.
Recommended collection pricing
The mid collection is priced at your minimum average sale minus the session fee — that’s the reveal target. Small is profitable but accessible. Large pulls the average up when clients choose it. The session fee is always charged separately and upfront.
Where you are vs where you need to be
| Now | Target | Six figures | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Average sale | — | — | — |
| Shoots / month | — | — | — |
| Pricing tier | — | — | Tier 4–5 |
Now you know the number.
Most photographers are told what to charge. Almost nobody shows them how to actually get there — how to structure the experience, present the pricing, and close the sale without it feeling like a sale.
That’s what the masterclass covers. Real systems, from a working studio.