IT Budget Calculator for Canadian Small Business
Estimate a realistic monthly and annual IT budget in about thirty seconds. Pick your headcount and service level, and the calculator builds a market-range estimate from published BC pricing norms. It is not a quote, and it never pretends to be one.
Build your estimate.
Every output is a low-to-high range anchored to the published BC market rate of $100 to $250 per user per month for managed support. Your tier positions you inside that range. Licensing and hardware are broken out so you can see exactly where the money goes.
Your inputs
$2,000 to $2,700
Estimated total monthly IT budget (CAD)
$24,000 to $32,400 per year
- Managed support (Professional, 10 users)$1,400 to $1,900
- Microsoft 365 Business Premium (list)$300
- Hardware refresh (amortised)$300 to $500
Support band is anchored to the typical BC market range of $100 to $250 per user per month. Microsoft list pricing changes; verify the current rate before you lock a budget. This is a planning range, not an offer. See our published pricing for how North Star's own tiers work.
What actually moves the number.
Two companies with the same headcount can land at opposite ends of the range. Here is why, so you can guess where you sit before anyone quotes you.
On-site needs
Remote-first environments are cheaper to support. If you need regular on-site visits, especially outside a major centre, there is a travel component. We dispatch field engineers from Prince George across BC, Alberta, and Yukon, and we scope that travel upfront rather than burying it in the rate.
Compliance obligations
PIPEDA applies to almost every Canadian business, and BC PIPA adds provincial rules. If you also face cyber-insurance questionnaires, SOC 2 readiness, or client security audits, you need the controls and the documentation, and that pushes you toward the top of the support band.
Backup scope
How much data you protect and how fast you need it back both matter. A team that can tolerate a day of downtime budgets differently than one that loses real money per hour. Verified restores and tighter recovery targets cost more, and they are usually worth it.
Current environment
Aging hardware, no MFA, shared passwords, and an unmanaged network all mean remediation work before steady-state pricing applies. Most providers, including us, charge an onboarding fee that reflects how much cleanup is needed. A tidy environment onboards cheaper.
How the provider charges
Per-user, per-device, block hours, and break-fix all produce different totals for the same company. This calculator assumes per-user pricing because that is the dominant model for managed IT in Canada. Our guide to MSP pricing models compares the alternatives.
Why a quote needs a call
A real quote requires a scoping call. Anyone who gives you a firm per-user price without seeing your environment is either padding the number to cover surprises or planning to renegotiate later. We do a short discovery, then quote a fixed per-user rate you can hold us to.
Want to see the math on a real scenario?
We wrote up the full IT budget for a typical 10-person company, line by line, including the trade-offs at each tier. If you want to sanity-check what this calculator produced, read the IT budget for a 10-person company next, then compare it against our published managed IT pricing.
Quick answers.
How much should a small business budget for IT in Canada?
For managed support alone, the BC market range is $100 to $250 per user per month. Add Microsoft 365 Business Premium at roughly $30 per user per month (list price) and amortised hardware at $30 to $50 per user per month, and a realistic all-in budget for most small businesses lands between roughly $160 and $330 per user per month.
Why does the calculator show a range instead of a single number?
Because a single number would be a guess dressed up as an answer. Real pricing depends on on-site needs, compliance obligations, backup scope, and the state of your current environment. The range reflects the honest spread of the BC market, with your tier choice positioning you inside it.
Is this an actual quote from North Star?
No. It is a market-range estimate built from published BC pricing norms and our own published tier structure. A real quote requires a scoping call so we can see your environment, count your devices, and understand your compliance needs. Book a free assessment and we will give you a firm per-user number.
Are Microsoft 365 licences included in managed IT pricing?
Usually not, and you should ask any provider to be explicit about this. Most MSPs, including North Star, bill Microsoft licensing as a pass-through on top of the per-user support fee. That is why the calculator breaks licensing out as its own line item.
Want a real number instead of a range?
Book a free 30-minute scoping call with a North Star engineer. We will look at your actual environment, your compliance picture, and your growth plans, then give you a fixed per-user quote you can budget against.
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