Straddle Calculator

Calculate the total premium, both break-evens and the move required for a long or short straddle to profit.

A straddle is a call and a put on the same underlying, at the same strike, with the same expiry, either both bought or both written, and this straddle calculator prices the pair at expiry. It is the standard way to take a position on the size of a move without taking one on its direction: the payoff is symmetric about the strike, and only the distance travelled counts.

Formula: break-evens = strike +/- total premium paid per share

Your figures

Currency

Position

Strike price

Both legs share this strike.

Call premium per share

As quoted, per share rather than per contract.

Put premium per share

As quoted, per share rather than per contract.

Number of contracts

One contract means one call and one put.

Shares per contract

From your own contract specification. 100 on standard US equity options.

Underlying price

Optional. The move required is measured against this price, and the position is valued at it.

Commission per contract

Charged on entry and exit for each leg, so four times per contract.

Results

Move required to break even

7.50%

US$7.50 either way, against the underlying price of US$100.00

Upper break-evenAbove this the call leg has covered both premiums and the commission.: US$107.50
Lower break-evenBelow this the put leg has covered both premiums and the commission.: US$92.50
Move required, in pointsMeasured from the strike, in either direction. The percentage above is this distance divided by the underlying price.: US$7.50
Premium per share, both legsCall plus put. This is the quote to hold against the expected move over the same number of days.: US$7.50
Total premium paidAcross every contract, after commission.: US$750.00
Shares controlledContracts multiplied by the shares each contract controls.: 100
Maximum profitThe call leg has no ceiling, so nothing bounds the upside.: Unlimited
Maximum lossThe whole outlay, lost only if the underlying finishes exactly at the strike, where both legs expire worthless.: US$750.00
Result at the price enteredAt expiry, if the underlying finished exactly there.: -US$750.00
Intrinsic value there, per shareBoth legs combined. Only one of them can be in the money at once.: US$0.00

What this means

Buying 1 straddle at the US$100.00 strike costs US$7.50 per share across both legs, US$750.00 in total after commission, over 100 shares. The position is level at US$107.50 and at US$92.50, so the underlying has to travel US$7.50 — 7.50% of the underlying price — beyond the strike before one leg's intrinsic value covers what both cost. Between those prices the outlay is not recovered, and the US$750.00 paid is the whole of what is at risk. Direction is irrelevant to the arithmetic: only the distance travelled counts.

Values both legs at expiry only. Before expiry each leg still carries time value, so closing the position early gives a different result.
Commission is charged as four fills: two legs, each opened and closed. Held to expiry one leg usually expires worthless and costs nothing to close, so this overstates the cost rather than understating it.
Assumes both legs share the same expiry and the same underlying, and that neither is assigned early. American options can be assigned before expiry, which matters most to a short position.
The move required is a distance, not a probability. The expected move calculator turns an implied volatility into the range the chain is pricing over the same number of days, which is what that distance is normally measured against.

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About the Straddle calculation

Because the two legs point opposite ways, at most one of them can hold intrinsic value when expiry arrives and the other expires worthless. That is what makes a straddle expensive to buy — the premium on both legs is paid, but only one is ever recovered — and it is why the underlying has to travel past the strike by the whole combined premium before a buyer is level.

That distance is the trade. A long straddle is a position that realised movement will exceed what the premium paid for; a short straddle is the same statement in reverse, with an unbounded loss attached to it. Everything else — which way the move goes, how quickly, whether it retraces — leaves the expiry arithmetic untouched.

Used as a long straddle calculator it takes the strike, both premiums, the size of the position and your own commission, and a written position takes exactly the same inputs. It returns both break-evens, the move required to reach one, that move as a percentage of the price it is measured against, and the maximum profit and loss on each side. The shares each contract controls is an input rather than an assumption, because index, futures and adjusted equity contracts all cover something other than 100.

Straddle formula

premium per share = call premium + put premium
shares controlled = contracts × shares per contract
total premium     = premium per share × shares controlled
commission        = rate per contract × contracts × 2 legs × 2 fills

long  distance = premium per share + commission per share
short distance = premium per share − commission per share

upper break-even = strike + distance
lower break-even = strike − distance
move required %  = distance ÷ reference price × 100

intrinsic per share at expiry:
  max(price − strike, 0) + max(strike − price, 0)

long : max loss   = total premium + commission,  max profit unlimited
short: max profit = total premium − commission,  max loss   unlimited

distance: How far past the strike the underlying must finish before the position is level. The same figure on both sides.
shares controlled: Contracts × the shares one contract covers, taken from your own contract specification.
commission per share: Total commission ÷ shares controlled, so four fills can be added to a per-share premium.
reference price: What the percentage is measured against — the underlying price if one is entered, otherwise the strike itself.
intrinsic: What the two legs are worth at expiry. Only one of them can be above zero at any price.

The break-evens sit the same distance either side of the strike because both legs share it. Above the strike the call carries the underlying's excess over it and the put is worth nothing; below it the put carries the shortfall and the call is worth nothing. Intrinsic value therefore grows point for point in either direction from the same place, so the combined premium is repaid at the same distance on both sides. That symmetry is what makes a single move-required figure meaningful at all — on a position with two different strikes there would be two different distances.

Commission is converted to a per-share figure rather than left as a lump so it can be added straight to the premium, and it pushes a buyer and a seller in opposite directions for the same reason. A buyer has to recover the commission as well as the premium, so the band between the break-evens widens; a seller has it deducted from the credit, so the band narrows. Four fills are charged — two legs, each opened and closed — which is deliberately pessimistic for a position held to expiry, where the worthless leg is normally abandoned rather than bought back.

The asymmetry between the long and the short is not a matter of degree. A buyer's loss is bounded by what was paid, and the call leg's profit has no ceiling because the underlying has no ceiling. A writer's profit is bounded by the credit received, and the short call's loss has no bound at all. The calculator prints "Unlimited" in those two places rather than a large number, because there is no figure to print: the payoff is a ray, not a segment.

Quoting the move required as a percentage as well as in points is what makes the position comparable with anything else. A percentage can be held against an implied volatility; a points figure cannot, because it means something different on a 20 underlying than on a 2,000 one. A straddle needing 7.5% over the coming month sits against whatever one standard deviation the chain prices over the same month, and the expected move calculator converts a quoted volatility into exactly that figure.

The reference price is reported alongside the percentage because the denominator is not obvious. With no underlying price entered the strike is the only sensible reference; with one entered the percentage is measured against the current price, which is the figure a reader actually compares against a chain's implied move. Leaving that ambiguous would make the percentage unusable, so it is labelled rather than assumed.

Straddle: a worked example

Buying two 100-strike straddles — the call at 4.00 and the put at 3.50 — on 100-share contracts, with the underlying at 100 and commission of 0.75 per contract.

Premium per share4.00 + 3.50 = 7.50
Shares controlled2 × 100 = 200
Total premium7.50 × 200 = 1,500.00
Commission0.75 × 2 contracts × 2 legs × 2 fills = 6.00
Commission per share6.00 ÷ 200 = 0.03
Distance to break even7.50 + 0.03 = 7.53
Upper break-even100 + 7.53 = 107.53
Lower break-even100 − 7.53 = 92.47
Move required7.53 ÷ 100 = 7.53%
Maximum loss1,500.00 + 6.00 = 1,506.00

1,506.00 at risk, and the underlying has to finish above 107.53 or below 92.47 before the position is worth more than it cost — a 7.53% move in either direction. Anywhere between those prices part of the outlay is gone, and at exactly 100 all of it is, since both legs expire worthless there. Above 107.53 nothing caps the gain, because the call leg has no ceiling.

How to use the Straddle calculator

Choose long to buy both legs or short to write them. Used as a short straddle calculator the break-evens sit closer together than on the long side, because commission is deducted from the credit rather than added to the debit.
Enter the strike both legs share, then each premium per share as quoted rather than the total cost of a contract.
Enter the number of contracts and the shares each one controls. One contract here means one call and one put.
Enter your own commission per contract. It is applied four times — two legs, each opened and closed — so a rate quoted per side needs no doubling before it goes in.
Enter the underlying price if you want the move required measured against where the market stands now rather than against the strike, and the position valued at that level.
Hold the move required against the expected move over the same number of days. That comparison, rather than the premium on its own, is what places the straddle against the volatility the chain is quoting.

Limitations of the Straddle calculator

Every calculation makes assumptions. These are the ones that matter here.

Values both legs at expiry only. Before expiry each leg still carries time value, so a straddle closed early settles somewhere other than the payoff shown here.
Commission is charged as four fills. Held to expiry the worthless leg is usually abandoned rather than bought back, so the cost here overstates rather than understates it.
Assumes neither leg is assigned early. American-style options can be assigned at any time, and an in-the-money short leg around a dividend is where that most often happens.
Excludes margin entirely. A short straddle is uncovered on both sides, every broker sets its own requirement, and that requirement can be raised while the position is open.
The move required is a distance, not a probability. Nothing here says how likely the underlying is to travel it — that depends on the volatility priced into the chain, which is a separate calculation.
Assumes both legs share one expiry and one underlying. A calendar or diagonal combination has a different shape and none of this arithmetic transfers to it.
Ignores any change in implied volatility. A long straddle bought before an event and closed after it can lose money even on a decent move, because both legs reprice at a lower volatility once the uncertainty resolves.
Assumes exercise and assignment settle cleanly. An underlying that finishes on the strike leaves both legs at zero intrinsic value but the assignment outcome unknown until after the close.

Frequently asked questions about Straddle

How is a straddle break-even worked out, and why are there two of them?

Each one is the strike plus or minus the combined premium, adjusted for commission, and there are two because the position has two legs facing opposite ways. Above the strike the call has to cover both premiums on its own; below it the put does. Since both start from the same strike, the two prices sit symmetrically either side of it.

Does an options straddle profit if the underlying falls as well as if it rises?

It does either, and the two are worth the same. The expiry arithmetic depends only on how far the underlying finishes from the strike, not on which side of it. A 10-point rise and a 10-point fall produce identical results, which is the property that distinguishes a straddle from any directional position.

Why is the maximum loss on a short straddle shown as unlimited?

Because the short call leg is uncovered and the underlying has no upper bound. Above the call strike the writer is obliged to deliver at the strike whatever it costs to buy, and that cost has no ceiling. The put leg's loss is bounded — the underlying can only fall to zero — but the call leg's is not.

How can I tell whether a straddle is expensive?

By comparing the move required with the move the chain's implied volatility prices over the same number of days. A break-even distance well inside the one standard deviation move means the straddle costs less than that volatility suggests; one outside it means the opposite. The premium on its own says nothing without that reference.

Why is commission multiplied by four?

Two legs, each opened and closed. A rate quoted per contract per fill is therefore charged four times for one straddle, which is easy to underestimate on a small position where the premium is only a few points. Held to expiry the worthless leg usually costs nothing to close, so the figure here is the pessimistic one.

What is the difference between a straddle and a strangle?

Only the strikes. A straddle puts both legs on one strike; a strangle pulls them apart so both start out of the money. The strangle costs less and needs a larger move, and it opens a flat band between the strikes where neither leg has any intrinsic value at all — which a straddle, having a single strike, does not have.

Last reviewed 29 August 2026. See our methodology and editorial policy.

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