Plan your IT spend with confidence. Get a recommended annual IT budget based on your revenue, team size, industry benchmarks, and growth plans.
| Industry | IT Spend (% Revenue) | Typical Range | Key Drivers |
|---|---|---|---|
| SME General | 3–4% | £30k–£200k | Office productivity, email, basic security |
| Professional Services | 4–6% | £50k–£500k | Collaboration, document management, compliance |
| Financial Services | 6–8% | £100k–£1M+ | Security, compliance, trading platforms |
| Healthcare | 4–6% | £50k–£500k | Patient data, NHS compliance, clinical systems |
| Technology | 5–8% | £80k–£800k | Dev tools, cloud infrastructure, CI/CD |
| Retail & Hospitality | 2–4% | £20k–£300k | POS systems, e-commerce, inventory |
Benchmarks are based on UK industry averages for SMEs (10–250 employees). Actual budgets vary significantly by business model, compliance requirements, and technology strategy. Learn about Virtual CIO services
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Most UK SMEs allocate roughly 2 to 6% of annual revenue to IT, with the figure trending higher for professional services and financial firms that depend heavily on technology, and lower for businesses with simpler infrastructure needs. Industry benchmarks are a useful starting point, but actual spend should reflect your specific risk and growth plans.
Start by categorising spend across support and helpdesk, hardware refresh cycles, software licensing, security, and cloud services, then benchmark each category against similar-sized organisations in your industry. This calculator generates a recommended allocation based on company size, giving you a defensible starting point rather than a guess.
A balanced budget usually splits across managed support, hardware and device refresh, software and cloud licensing, cybersecurity tools, and a contingency for unplanned projects. Security spend has grown as a share of IT budgets in recent years as SMEs face increasing ransomware and phishing risk, often now taking 15 to 20% of the total.
Most organisations should review their IT budget annually alongside broader financial planning, with a lighter quarterly check-in to track actual spend against forecast. Major changes like office moves, headcount growth, or a shift to new cloud platforms usually warrant an off-cycle budget revision rather than waiting for the next annual review.
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