SSmokeCalc
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About

Why we built SmokeCalc

Last reviewed: 2026-06-05

SmokeCalc started with a question. A friend had been smoking for fourteen years and was thinking about quitting — but every quit-smoking resource he found was either a clinical intervention (he did not need one), a nicotine replacement ad (he did not want one), or a government brochure full of population-level statistics that did not feel like they applied to him.

He wanted to know: how much is this actually costing me? Not in the abstract. His number, in his currency, given the way he actually smokes.

We built a calculator. It was simple — cigarettes per day, price per pack, year you started. The output was a number, in dollars, that made him put down the cigarette he was about to light. That number has been the spine of SmokeCalc ever since.

Our principles

SmokeCalc runs on a short set of principles. They are the same now as on day one. If we ever break one, that is when you should stop trusting the site.

  1. 01

    Free forever. No paywalls, no premium tiers.

    The calculators are the product. We monetize through unobtrusive ads and voluntary Ko-fi donations. We will never charge for a feature.

  2. 02

    No signup required.

    You can use every calculator with zero friction. The only data we hold is what you explicitly enter into the optional email companion.

  3. 03

    Evidence-based data.

    All health numbers come from CDC, WHO, NHS, American Lung Association, American Heart Association, American Cancer Society, and the British Medical Journal. Financial calculations use plain math — no hidden multipliers, no optimistic assumptions.

  4. 04

    No fear-based imagery or guilt-tripping copy.

    We show you your numbers. We let the math do the work. There are no pictures of diseased lungs, no shame-based messaging, no judgment.

  5. 05

    Privacy by design.

    Plausible Analytics only. No cookies, no cross-site tracking, no personal data collection. Your inputs stay in your browser.

How we handle health data

Every health claim on SmokeCalc is sourced. The 20-minute heart-rate drop, the 24-hour heart-attack-risk drop, the 1-year heart-disease halving, the 10-year lung-cancer halving, the 15-year full cardiovascular recovery — all of these are drawn from named studies and named health agencies.

We do not invent numbers. We do not round up to make a point. The 11-minutes-per-cigarette figure is from a 2013 British Medical Journal paper by Shaw et al. that synthesized mortality data from the U.S. National Health Interview Survey. The 50-year British Doctors Study (Doll, Peto, Boreham, Sutherland, BMJ 2004) is the basis for the lifetime-life-expectancy estimates. The health recovery milestones come from CDC, NHS, the American Lung Association, and the American Heart Association.

Where a number has uncertainty — and most do — we say so in the calculator. Where your individual result will differ from the population average, we say so too. The page is informational, not a substitute for a medical professional.

Data sources

  • CDC — Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
    US adult smoking rates, youth tobacco use, state-level tobacco economics.
  • WHO — World Health Organization
    Global tobacco prevalence, tobacco tax policy, MPOWER implementation.
  • NHS — UK National Health Service
    UK smoking rates, health recovery milestones, quitline information.
  • American Lung Association
    Health benefits of quitting, lung recovery timeline.
  • American Heart Association
    Cardiovascular recovery timeline, heart disease risk reduction.
  • American Cancer Society
    Cancer risk reduction over time after quitting.
  • British Medical Journal (BMJ)
    Shaw et al. 2013 study on 11 minutes of life lost per cigarette; Doll et al. 2004 British Doctors Study (50-year mortality follow-up).

Editorial standards

Every page is reviewed before publication. The review checks: (1) every number has a citable source; (2) no fear-based or shame-based language; (3) no promises of guaranteed success; (4) medical disclaimers are present where appropriate. Pages are re-reviewed annually or when a major study contradicts a number we publish.

If you spot an error — a typo, a wrong number, a broken link — please tell us. We fix user-reported errors within 48 hours.

What we will never do

  • Sell user data — to anyone, ever.
  • Charge for a calculator feature or build a premium tier.
  • Use scare imagery or guilt-based copy.
  • Show popups, interstitials, or forced registration walls.
  • Display tobacco brand logos or promote any nicotine product.
  • Inflate metrics or manufacture social proof.

Contact

General: hello@quitsmokingcalc.com
Corrections: corrections@quitsmokingcalc.com

Try the calculators

If you have not already: open the cost calculator, see your number, then open the health timeline to see what your body is already doing about it.