Trucking company KPI dashboard template: eight numbers, with the formulas

A trucking company can look busy and still lose money. The trucks are moving, the phone is ringing, and the bank balance keeps dropping. A KPI dashboard is how you see it early: a handful of numbers, the same ones every week, per truck and for the fleet.

You don't need software for this. Eight numbers, a few inputs you already have, and fifteen minutes on Monday morning are enough.

Template only, not accounting advice. Have your accountant check how you count costs.

Your dashboard

YOUR WEEKLY KPI DASHBOARD

Enter last week's numbers. They stay in this browser. Not accounting advice.

Trucks this week

Revenue this week

$

All costs this week (fuel, pay, payments, insurance, repairs, fees)

$

Loaded miles

Empty miles

Loads delivered

Loads delivered on time

Average drivers this year

Drivers who left this year

• Revenue per truck, week

  $0

  Revenue / trucks

• Cost per mile

  -

  All costs / total miles

• Revenue per mile

  -

  Revenue / total miles

• Operating ratio

  -

  Costs / revenue (under 100% means profit)

• Empty miles share

  -

  Empty miles / total miles

• On-time share

  -

  On-time loads / loads delivered

• Driver turnover, year

  0.0%

  Drivers who left / average drivers

• Profit this week

  $0

  Revenue - costs

Download the spreadsheet (.csv)PrintClear

Enter last week's numbers; the dashboard calculates as you type and saves in this browser. Download the spreadsheet to track several weeks side by side; the formulas work in Excel and Google Sheets.

The eight KPIs and their formulas

How to fill it out

1. Pick a week that ends the same day each time, such as Sunday.
2. Revenue: every load delivered that week, including fuel surcharge and accessorials you'll be paid for.
3. Costs: everything. Fuel, driver pay, truck and trailer payments, insurance, repairs, tires, tolls, permits, dispatch and factoring fees, and a weekly share of yearly costs like registration.
4. Miles: loaded and empty, from the ELD or telematics.
5. Loads and on-time: loads delivered, and how many arrived within the appointment.
6. Drivers: for turnover, the average number of drivers this year and how many left.

Do it per truck as well as for the fleet. The small fleet cost per truck calculator splits costs by unit.

Benchmarks, used carefully

Industry averages give context, not targets. ATRI's 2025 data put the average operating cost per mile at $2.336/miATRI, Operational Costs of T…Average operating cost per mile, 2025$2.336/miATRI's 2026 Analysis of the Operational Costs of Trucking: industry average for 2025, up from $2.260 in 2024. Fuel about $0.482/mi; non-fuel $1.854/mi; driver wages and benefits $1.028/mi.ATRI, Operational Costs of Trucking (2026 edition), 2025Checked Oct 2026Close, or $1.854/miATRI, Operational Costs of T…Non-fuel cost per mile, 2025$1.854/miATRI, Operational Costs of Trucking (2026 edition), 2025Checked Oct 2026Close excluding fuel. Repair and maintenance averaged $0.215/miATRI, Operational Costs of T…Repair and maintenance cost per mile, 2025$0.215/miATRI's 2026 Operational Costs of Trucking: repair and maintenance (parts, labor, roadside service; tires counted separately at about $0.05/mi) averaged $0.215 per mile in 2025, up 8.6% from 2024. Truckload fleets under 5 trucks averaged $0.275 per mile, against $0.169 for fleets over 1,000 trucks. By region: Midwest 21.4, Northeast 22.1, Southeast 19.8, South Central 19.4 and West 21.9 cents per mile.ATRI, Operational Costs of Trucking (2026 edition), 2025Checked Oct 2026Close. For turnover, published figures range widely by segment; see truck driver turnover rate. Your equipment, region and freight make your numbers different. Use the averages to spot something unusual, then price from your own costs.

Reading the dashboard

Cost per mile rising? Check fuel per mile, repairs and empty miles first. A truck with a mechanical problem often shows up here before it breaks down.

Revenue per truck uneven? One unit far below the others may be sitting too many days, running empty more, or hauling weaker freight.

Operating ratio near 100%? You're working for free. Raise floor rates, cut empty miles, or find costs to trim before adding trucks.

On-time share slipping? Look at appointment planning and dwell time; see dwell time in trucking.

EXAMPLE A four-truck regional fleet fills in the dashboard every Monday. After six weeks, Unit 103 shows a cost per mile well above the other three and an empty miles share nearly twice the fleet average. The owner moves Unit 103 to a lane with better reloads and books a shop visit; its fuel economy had dropped because of a failing injector.

Setting targets for your fleet

Targets should come from your own history and your own costs, not from someone else's fleet. A practical way to start:

• Floor rate per mile: your cost per mile plus the margin you need. Every load booked below it loses money on paper before anything goes wrong.
• Empty miles share: take your last quarter's average and aim to bring it down a little each quarter through better reload planning.
• On-time share: most shippers and brokers expect nearly every load on time; track every miss and its reason.
• Revenue per truck: set it from what each truck needs to cover its fixed costs, driver pay and a profit, then see which units fall short and why.

Write the targets next to the dashboard and look at both every Monday.

Common counting mistakes

• Leaving out yearly costs. Registration, insurance down payments, UCR and permits belong in weekly costs as a share of the year, or cost per mile looks better than it is.
• Forgetting the owner's pay. If the owner drives or dispatches, count a fair wage as a cost. Otherwise the business looks profitable only because the owner works for free.
• Counting only loaded miles. Cost per mile must use all miles; empty miles cost the same fuel and wear.
• Mixing weeks. Count loads by delivery date (or pickup date) every time, not one way one week and another way the next.
• Skipping the slow weeks. The weeks you'd rather not look at are the ones that tell you the most.

Weekly vs monthly

Weekly numbers jump around: one long load or one shop visit can swing a week. Look at each week to catch problems quickly, then at a four-week average to see the trend. The downloadable spreadsheet has four weekly columns for exactly that. Once a quarter, compare the trend for each truck with the others and with the same quarter last year if you have it.

Who sees it

Share the fleet dashboard with whoever runs dispatch, billing and maintenance. Each role owns some of the numbers; see the trucking company org chart template. Drivers can see their own unit's on-time share and miles; it makes conversations about routes and idling specific. Pay and home time should be written down too, in the truck driver handbook template.

Eight numbers, every week

The dashboard is the numbers side of truck fleet management. Put your website inquiries into the same weekly review if you're building direct freight; see the trucking website template. For how our desk reports per truck, see small fleet dispatch.

Our view: eight numbers, every week, per truck. Most problems in a small fleet show up in these numbers weeks before they show up in the bank account.