Computing the ROI of Code Review

Everyone agrees that peer code inspection finds bugs, makes code more maintainable, and promotes learning and sharing. But how much time does it take? Are the savings worth the expense?

Use this ROI calculator to see the business case for CodeCollaborator and CodeReviewer.

For the table below, the default numbers come from industry-standard sources, including some of our own customer data. When you consider the cost per defect in QA or at the customer site, consider the time to find and the time to fix, and try to account for intangibles such as Customer Goodwill.

Cost of finding and fixing bugs without code review

	Cost/ Defect	Total Cost
Cost to find/fix defects in QA =	X	= $
Cost to find/fix defects at customer site =	X	= $
*Total Without* Code Review:**		$

Cost of finding and fixing bugs with CodeCollaborator / CodeReviewer

	# Defects	Cost/ Defect	Total Cost
Cost to find/fix defects in review =	¹	X $²	= $
Cost to find/fix defects in QA =	³	X $	= $
Cost to find/fix defects at customer site =	³	X $	= $
*Total With* Code Review:**			$

This calculation represents a savings of % , or $, per release cycle.
Cost of the code review tool is not included in this evaluation. Use our Pricing Page to get this cost depending on tool choice, the number of developers, and licensing scheme.

¹ Industry-standard rate: 45% of defects are found during code review instead of QA or at customer sites.
² Industry-standard rate, also found in several case studies at Smart Bear's customer sites: Code review typically costs 30% that of QA because bugs are found faster and locations/methods of fixes are already identified.
³ Code review removes defects both from QA and at customer sites, so these numbers are reduced proportionally.