Work Rate Calculator

This work rate calculator works out how long two people or machines take to finish a job when they work together, using the trick of adding rates rather than averaging times. Enter how long each one takes to complete the job alone, in any matching unit such as hours, days or minutes, and the calculator returns the combined rate, shown as jobs completed per unit time, plus the time it takes them to finish together in a plain result line such as "Together: 2.4 time units." Behind the scenes each worker's speed is treated as a fraction of the job done per unit time; those two fractions are added to get the combined rate, then the reciprocal gives the joint time, which is always shorter than either one alone. This suits painting, laying pipe, filling a tank, writing code or any shared task, whether you are checking a textbook problem, planning a roster, or estimating how fast a joint effort finishes. Change either time and the result updates instantly. The same method extends to three or more workers by adding all their rates before taking the reciprocal, a shortcut covered in the FAQs below alongside a worked example using the default values of 4 and 6 hours. Results are rounded for display, so treat the answer as a close approximation rather than an exact figure.

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