Driver Offer AdvisorWhat a kilometre actually costs you
8 min read
Fuel is the cost you feel, because you hand over money for it. Everything else about running a car for work arrives quietly: as a worn tire, as a car worth less than it was, as a renewal you pay once a year and never connect to any particular trip.
Those quiet costs are the ones that decide whether a week was actually worth driving.
The figures we use, and where they come from
These are the ownership costs behind Driver Offer Advisor, for a mainstream sedan in the Greater Toronto Area, spread over 40,000 km a year. We are publishing them with their sources because a cost model you cannot check is just an opinion with a decimal point.
| Cost | Source | Per km |
|---|---|---|
| Depreciation | CAA Driving Costs, Ontario mainstream passenger car (2025), adjusted for a working driver's distance | $0.103 |
| Insurance | rates.ca average annual premium, metro Toronto (2025) | $0.072 |
| Tires | Canadian retail pricing (2025), all-season and winter sets blended | $0.020 |
| Licensing | Ontario plate renewal plus a Toronto vehicle licence | $0.003 |
| Total ownership | Before any fuel | $0.198 |
Roughly twenty cents a kilometre before you have bought a single litre. On a 40 km trip that is about $8 of your fare gone to costs you never see on a receipt.
Two honest caveats about that table
- The insurance figure is a base personal premium. A rideshare endorsement costs extra and is quoted per driver, so it is not included. Your real number is likely higher, not lower.
- Depreciation is not linear in distance. A car loses value with age as well as use, which is why simply doubling an association's 20,000 km figure for a 40,000 km year gives the wrong answer. We split it into a time-driven half and a distance-driven half and scale only the second.
The distinction almost nobody makes
Here is the part that changes how you should read your own numbers.
Some of those costs only happen because you took the trip. Others you pay whether the car moves or not.
Marginal costs scale with the trip: depreciation and tires, about $0.123/km for that sedan. Fixed costs are paid regardless: insurance and licensing, about $0.075/km at 40,000 km a year.
Why it matters: your insurance bill is identical whether you accept the next offer or decline it. So charging a share of it against one particular trip does not help you make that decision. The trip is worth taking if it clears what it actually costs you to drive it, plus what your hour is worth.
The fixed costs still have to be paid, of course. They are a daily problem, not a per-offer one: they set how many hours you need to work before the day is profitable at all, and that is the right place to think about them.
This is why the app's live verdict deducts fuel and maintenance, and says so plainly on every result. It gives you the cost of this trip for the decision you are making right now, rather than quietly folding in an annual bill.
Working out your own number
The table above is a mainstream sedan. Your car is not that car. To get closer:
- Fuel or charge. Divide what you spend in a typical week by the kilometres you drove that week. This one you can measure exactly, so measure it.
- Tires. Take what a set costs you, divide by the kilometres you get out of them, and remember a second set if you swap for winter.
- Depreciation. Look up what your model sold for a year ago against today at your mileage. Unpleasant, and the largest number on the list for most drivers.
- Insurance and licensing. Annual totals divided by the kilometres you genuinely expect to drive this year. Be honest about that figure.
Add the first three for your per-trip cost, which is the one to judge an offer against. Keep the fourth separate as your daily nut.
Then put your number into the trip calculator and see what last night's offers really paid.
Why this matters more than it used to
When a fare is quoted up front, you are being offered a price for a job whose costs only you know. The platform knows the distance. You are the only one who knows what your kilometre costs.
A driver who knows their number to the cent can answer any offer in seconds. A driver who does not is guessing, and will guess wrong in the same direction every time, because gross always looks better than net.
Driver Offer Advisor does this maths on every offer.
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General information for Canadian rideshare drivers, not financial, legal or tax advice. Advisory only. Not affiliated with Uber or Lyft. No earnings are guaranteed.