How to price a monthly retainer
Last updated: July 2026
A retainer is not measured in deliverables. You are selling a block of monthly capacity plus something clients quietly value even more: priority.
In short: a retainer is monthly hours times your target rate, minus at most a 10% loyalty discount, with rollover, scope and notice terms in writing. AI changed the hours, not the arithmetic.
Guaranteed hours, faster answers, a person who already knows their business. That second part is why a retainer should never be priced as "my hours, minus a discount".
The formula is short: monthly hours × your hourly rate, minus at most a small loyalty discount, plus clear terms. The terms are where retainers are won or lost.
The terms checklist
The pricing rule
Retainer price = monthly hours × your target rate, with a loyalty discount of 10% at most. The discount pays for predictable income. Anything bigger means the client is buying your priority for free.
Why the discount stays small
The classic mistake is treating a retainer like a bulk purchase: "20 hours a month, so half price per hour". But a retainer costs you something a one-off project does not: reserved capacity.
Those hours are blocked for this client whether they use them or not, and blocked capacity is what you sell to nobody else. Predictable income can be worth a small discount, sure, but it is not worth your margin.
Run the numbers in the calculator's Monthly view: with the default target rate of $31/h, a 15-hour retainer prices around $465 a month at full rate, or about $420 with a 10% loyalty discount.
Below your survival rate, a retainer is a subscription to losing money.
When the client says AI should make it cheaper
Retainer renegotiations now often include one new sentence: "with AI, this must take you less time". The honest answer is that the retainer never sold time alone. It sells capacity, priority and judgment.
If tools make you faster, the client gets more done within the same hours, which is a better deal than a discount. Resize the scope if the need really shrank. Do not reprice the hour because your tools improved.
Nobody asks their accountant for a discount because the accountant bought better software.
What moves the price
Up: guaranteed same-day responses, on-call availability, specialized skills with few substitutes, a client whose work always arrives urgent.
Down: flexible timing (their work fills your gaps), a long stable relationship, genuinely predictable and repetitive scope.
Price your version
Target rate
Target Pay
desired monthly income, before tax
Monthly Costs
monthly costs to stay afloat
Billable hours
billable hours per week
Weeks off
vacation, holidays, sick days
Drag any blue number to adjust (click it to type). Your inputs carry over to the full tool. Access full tool
Set your real numbers, switch the ladder to Monthly, and multiply your target rate by the capacity you are reserving. That number, minus at most 10%, is the retainer.
What is your month worth?
Your target rate, in monthly form, is the base of every retainer you will ever sign. Know it first.
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Read next
Day rates and monthly billing for consultants and analysts →The retainer's cousin: selling days and months instead of deliverables.