Free Clinical Trial Budget Template (Excel)
What's inside the free clinical trial budget template
The Study Budget sheet comes pre-filled with 20 typical clinical trial budget lines, from IRB / ethics review fees and site initiation visits through per-visit procedures, patient stipends, coordinator and investigator time, institutional overhead, and closeout activities.
Each line has a Category dropdown, a unit cost, a quantity, and a Line total that calculates automatically - so instead of building a budget structure from a blank sheet, you're adjusting a realistic starting point to your protocol.
With 60 rows total, there's room to add your own lines alongside the 20 pre-filled ones for anything specific to your study or site.
Budget structure: six categories from startup to closeout
Every budget line is tagged with one of six categories: Startup / regulatory, Per-patient, Per-visit procedures, Staff time, Overhead, or Closeout - the same buckets sponsors and sites typically use to organize a trial budget.
The summary totals each category separately, so you get a subtotal for startup costs, per-patient costs, per-visit procedures, staff time, overhead, and closeout, plus a grand total for the whole study.
Categorizing every line this way makes it easy to see where the budget's weight actually sits - a study with a long visit schedule will show a large per-visit procedures subtotal, for example.
How each line's cost calculates (unit cost x quantity)
Each line's total is simply unit cost x quantity - enter what one unit of that line costs and how many units you need, and the Line total column fills in automatically.
For a per-visit procedure, that might mean the cost of one procedure and the number of times it's performed across your visit schedule and enrolled patients; for a startup fee, quantity is usually 1.
Because the calculation is a straightforward multiplication rather than a fixed formula tied to enrollment numbers, you decide how to translate your protocol's visit schedule and enrollment target into the quantity for each line.
Personnel and per-visit costs: using quantity to reflect real volume
For per-visit and per-patient lines, use quantity to reflect real volume: visits per patient x number of patients for procedures, or number of enrolled patients (including any expected screen failures) for per-patient costs like stipends.
Coordinator and investigator time lines work the same way - enter a cost per hour or per patient and a quantity that reflects the effort you expect across the study, and the line total scales with it.
Because quantity is just a number you enter, you're responsible for building in your own assumptions about enrollment, screen-fail rate, or visit frequency - the sheet doesn't calculate those for you from a separate assumptions panel.
Overhead and closeout: treating them as budget lines, not automatic calculations
Overhead and closeout costs are budget lines like any other in this template - enter a unit cost and quantity for your institution's overhead charge or closeout activities, and they roll into their own category subtotal.
This is deliberately simple: there's no automatic overhead-percentage calculation applied across other categories, since institutional indirect cost rates and how they're applied vary too much to model as one formula.
If your institution applies overhead as a percentage of direct costs, calculate that amount separately and enter it as a single Overhead line's unit cost, with a quantity of 1.
How to use it
- Start from the pre-filled 20 budget lines and adjust them to your protocol, adding your own lines as needed.
- Enter unit cost and quantity per line - the Line total calculates automatically as cost x quantity.
- Use the Category dropdown so startup, per-patient, per-visit, staff time, overhead, and closeout costs stay separated.
- Check the category subtotals and the grand total before using the budget in a sponsor or IRB negotiation.
Download the free Free Clinical Trial Budget Template (Excel)
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Frequently asked questions
Can I use this in Google Sheets?
Yes. Upload the file to Google Drive and open it with File > Save as Google Sheets. The line totals and category subtotals keep working.
Is this a substitute for my institution's official budget process?
No. It's a budgeting and negotiation-prep tool for site/sponsor budget discussions, not a substitute for your institution's official budget template or approval process.
How many budget lines can I track?
The sheet has 60 rows, including the 20 pre-filled lines, so there's room to add lines specific to your protocol or site.
Does it calculate enrollment or screen-fail numbers for me?
No. Quantity is a number you enter per line - for per-visit or per-patient lines, work out your own visits-per-patient or enrolled-patient count (including expected screen failures) and enter it as the quantity.
Does it apply an overhead rate automatically?
No. Overhead is a budget line like any other - enter your institution's overhead as a unit cost and quantity, and it totals into its own category.
Is it free?
Yes, in exchange for your email address. It's yours to use afterward with no further cost.