Estimate your data center space cost in under a minute.
Enter a target power block, term, and workload. The result is an illustrative recurring cost range based on a published Northern Virginia market benchmark, not a vendor quote.
A benchmark with visible assumptions.
CBRE reported a Northern Virginia asking-rate range of $190 to $235 per kW per month for 250 to 500 kW requirements in Q1 2026. That is the calculator's base. It then makes modest planning adjustments so a 50 kW cage is not treated like a 5 MW wholesale block.
Requirement size
Deployments below 250 kW receive a planning premium. Requirements above 500 kW receive a scale adjustment. Real unit pricing still depends on available blocks and commercial leverage.
Contract term
Shorter terms receive a planning premium. A 60-month term receives a modest discount, while 36 months remains the neutral base.
Workload type
High-density and regulated workloads receive an uplift for tighter facility fit and possible engineering needs. Disaster recovery receives a modest reduction.
Cabinet equivalent
The cabinet count is a rough power-density translation, not a space design. It uses 8 kW per cabinet for standard workloads and 25 kW for high-density compute.
Benchmark source: CBRE Global Data Center Trends 2026. Published market asking rates are not specific operator quotes.
Costs to add before finance sees the number
- Cabinets, cages, suites, containment, and installation work.
- Cross-connects, carrier ports, internet transit, cloud on-ramps, and diverse routes.
- Migration labor, logistics, staging, and overlapping service during cutover.
- Remote hands, smart hands, equipment disposal, and scheduled support.
- Metered or pass-through electricity components, taxes, and annual escalators.
- Custom security, compliance evidence, liquid cooling, or unusual structural requirements.
Use the range to decide whether colocation belongs on the shortlist and to set an initial budget. Use a live RFP to discover actual capacity and normalize each provider's complete three-to-five-year cost.
Check the estimate against the public record
A planning range is only useful if you can test it. These are the published figures the calculator's assumptions sit against, so you can see whether a number it produces is plausible before taking it to finance.
| Reference | Figure | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Northern Virginia asking rent | $190 to $235/kW-mo | CBRE, 250 to 500 kW, Q1 2026. The calculator's base range |
| Primary markets average | $196.25/kW-mo | CBRE, 250 to 500 kW, H2 2025, up 6.6% |
| Sub-1 MW deployments | $293/kW-mo | Digital Realty reported, Americas, Q2 2026 |
| Above 1 MW | $157/kW-mo | Digital Realty reported, all regions, Q2 2026 |
| Per billed cabinet | $2,538/cabinet-mo | Equinix reported global average, Q2 2026 |
| Large-block rate change | Up 12.5% | 3 to 10 MW requirements, year over year |
Full sourcing for every figure is on the pricing benchmarks page. If the calculator returns a figure well outside these bands for a comparable requirement, the inputs are probably wrong rather than the market being unusual.
Divide your total monthly cost by your committed kW. If the result is far below $157 per kW-month, the estimate is likely missing charges. If it is far above $293 per kW-month for a standard-density deployment, either the density is high enough to change the product or the requirement is small enough to be priced as retail cabinets rather than wholesale power.
Why small deployments cost more per kW
The largest driver of unit cost is not market or provider. It is size, and the effect is bigger than most first-time buyers expect.
Two figures from the same operator in the same quarter make the point cleanly: $293 per kW-month below 1 MW against $157 per kW-month above it. That is a premium of roughly 1.87 times for committing less power. If your requirement sits just under a pricing tier, ask what the next tier costs, because committing slightly more power or a longer term sometimes lowers the total bill rather than raising it.
The same logic runs downward. A single cabinet at low density can imply an effective rate above $300 per kW-month once you divide the cabinet price by its power licence. Density is what converts a space cost into a sensible power cost, which is why the calculator asks for it.
What this estimate deliberately excludes
Every item below is real, recurring or material, and none of it is in the range above. Add them before the number goes anywhere near an approval.
| Excluded item | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Cross-connects and cloud on-ramps | Monthly per connection, per carrier. At small scale can rival space cost |
| Bandwidth and transit | Commit level, burst treatment and overage rate |
| Remote hands | Included minutes, hourly rate and the after-hours multiplier |
| One-time charges | Setup, cabinets, cage build, cabling, commissioning |
| Power pass-through | Utility cost changes that flow to you, and how PUE is treated |
| Escalators | 2.5% to 5% annually, compounding across the term |
| Renewal | Digital Realty reported renewal rents up 25.4% on a cash basis in Q2 2026 |
| Migration and exit | Move cost, overlap during transition, restoration obligations |
The escalator and the renewal are the two that most often break a business case, because they act at the end of the term when the original approval is long forgotten. Model both to term end. A 2% and a 5% escalator on the same opening rate diverge substantially over ten years, and a renewal at market can reset the whole calculation.
Get real availability without giving one operator the whole frame.
A scout can translate the requirement, check the current market, and bring back comparable options from the facilities that fit.