Agriculture · local calculation

Feed Conversion Ratio Calculator

Feed is your biggest livestock cost. FCR tells you how efficiently animals convert feed to gain, and cost of gain puts a dollar figure on every pound. Both are essential for margins.

Direct answer

What does this tool do?

Feed Conversion Ratio Calculator computes the result directly in your browser — Feed is your biggest livestock cost. FCR tells you how efficiently animals convert feed to gain, and cost of gain puts a dollar figure on every pound. Both are essential for margins. Nothing you enter is uploaded or stored.

Feed consumed (pounds (or lbs of dry matter))

Weight gained (pounds)

Feed cost ($ for that feed)

Formula: FCR = feed consumed (lb) ÷ weight gained (lb). Cost of gain = total feed cost ÷ pounds gained. Lower is better: poultry ~1.5-2, swine ~2.5-3, grain-fed beef ~6-8 in typical operations — species and stage of production differ widely. Include all feed: grain, forage/hay, supplements, and waste. Forage-fed systems need dry-matter basis for an honest comparison. Use: compare FCR and cost of gain across pens, rations, or genetics to find where feed dollars are leaking.

How this calculator works

Formula: FCR = feed consumed (lb) ÷ weight gained (lb). Cost of gain = total feed cost ÷ pounds gained. Lower is better: poultry ~1.5-2, swine ~2.5-3, grain-fed beef ~6-8 in typical operations — species and stage of production differ widely. Include all feed: grain, forage/hay, supplements, and waste. Forage-fed systems need dry-matter basis for an honest comparison. Use: compare FCR and cost of

Worked example

3,000 lb of feed producing 800 lb of gain: FCR = 3.75 (3,000 / 800). At $600 of feed, cost of gain is $0.75/lb ($600 / 800).

How Feed Conversion Ratio Calculator is calculated, step by step — Step-by-step: how this feed conversion ratio calculation builds its result

FAQ

What is a good feed conversion ratio?

It depends on species: poultry runs ~1.5-2, swine ~2.5-3, and grain-fed beef ~6-8. Lower is more efficient — the same gain on less feed.

How do I calculate cost of gain?

Divide the total feed cost by the total pounds gained. It tells you the feed cost embedded in each pound of animal you produce — the key number for marketing and breakeven.

Does forage vs grain change FCR?

Yes — animals on high-forage rations convert feed to gain less efficiently by weight than on grain, but forage is cheaper per pound. Compare on dry-matter and cost basis, not just FCR.

Figures are editable example defaults for planning, not guarantees. Crop inputs, prices, and moisture handling vary by farm, region, and year — verify with your local extension service and agronomist.

A broiler batch from chick to market

A broiler house starts 20,000 chicks and targets a 6.5 lb market bird, so total gain is 20,000 x 6.5 = 130,000 lb. At a flock FCR of 1.8, expected feed use is 130,000 x 1.8 = 234,000 lb of finished feed, about 117 tons.

If feed averages $0.28 per lb delivered, total feed cost is 234,000 x $0.28 = $65,520. Cost of gain is $65,520 / 130,000 = $0.504 per lb of live weight. That single number is the quick sanity check: at a $0.65/lb contract price, feed alone leaves roughly $0.146 per lb to cover chick cost at about $0.42 per chick ($8,400 per house), fuel, litter, labor, and mortality above the assumed 3 percent.

The same arithmetic shows why FCR matters more than volume. If poor ventilation pushes FCR to 1.95, feed use rises to 253,500 lb and cost of gain becomes $0.558 per lb, an extra $0.054 per lb, or about $7,020 per flock on 130,000 lb of gain.

Where real-world FCR numbers drift

Feed delivered is not feed eaten. Spilled feed under feeders, fines pushed out by birds, and wind loss in bunks can run 2 to 5 percent of tonnage, so a metered 1.8 FCR may be a true 1.84 to 1.89. Weigh scales drift too: a bin unloading error of 300 lb on a 234,000 lb batch shifts FCR by 0.002, but a mis-tared feed truck at 1,000 lb shifts it by about 0.008.

Gain timing matters. If you weigh birds mid-week and market on Friday, partial-day feed on the last days inflates the ratio; a batch marketed 2 days late at 0.5 lb/day feed intake and 0.15 lb/day gain adds roughly 0.01 to the FCR with no benefit.

Moisture is the biggest distortion in mixed rations. A ration blended from 60 percent dry grain and 40 percent 65 percent-moisture silage looks heavier per unit of dry matter; on an as-fed basis a cattle FCR of 6.5 may equal about 5.1 on a dry-matter basis. Conversion tables use the same math as the calculator above: multiply as-fed tonnage by dry-matter fraction before dividing. Compare rations only after that step, then compare cost of gain, since cheap wet forage often wins even at worse FCR.