Budget Template: Documentary Film
A free documentary budget template organized the way non-fiction is made: development and research, a small field crew, a long edit, then post. It opens in Saturation as a live budget, so you can track actuals across a shoot that runs for months or years.
What's in this documentary budget template
The template has 14 accounts and 91 starter line items, grouped the way documentary budgets are read by funders and broadcasters:
Section | Accounts |
|---|---|
Above the line | 1 Story Development and Script (writers, research and development), 2 Producer (executive producer, producer/director, associate producer), 3 Director |
Production | 4 Production Staff (head researcher, archivist and stills, coordinator), 5 Host, Advisors and Consultants (on-camera host, voice-over, advisors), 6 Crew (DP, sound, electrician, travel days), 7 Equipment, 8 Location Expenses (broken out per location: travel, car rental, hotel and food, ground transport, permits), 9 Stock |
Post-production | 10 Editorial (editor, assistant editor, sound and music editors, edit room), 11 Post-Production (titles, CGI, transfers), 12 Music (original composition, recording, musicians), 13 Post-Production Sound (temp and final mix) |
Overhead | 14 General Overhead (legal, office, accountant, bookkeeper, final audit) |
A sample documentary budget, by phase
Documentary money usually arrives in stages, so it helps to see the budget by phase as well as by account. The International Documentary Association's 2025 budgeting guide uses this phased top sheet as its example:
Phase | Amount | Share |
|---|---|---|
Research and development | $82,100 | 12% |
Production | $216,300 | 32% |
Editing | $158,000 | 23% |
Post-production | $171,750 | 25% |
Festivals, publicity and promotion | $48,550 | 7% |
Total (includes contingency and a fiscal sponsor fee on grant money) | $676,700 | 100% |
Use the phase view to answer the question every funder asks: how much do you need to raise, and by when?
Documentary budget lines that are easy to miss
- Contingency. IDA puts a typical documentary contingency at 6% to 10%. Some funders do not allow a contingency line, in which case you have to build the cushion into individual lines.
- Archival footage and stills. Many archives charge a 30-second minimum per clip, so budget for more seconds than you will use on screen. Archive-heavy films often bring in an archival producer during budgeting.
- Errors and omissions (E&O) insurance. Usually required for distribution. The application can take weeks and often needs an opinion letter from a clearance attorney covering any fair use material.
- Director and producer fees. IDA's rule of thumb is 5% to 10% of the budget each, often higher on small budgets and capped on large ones.
- Production services fee. On a fully commissioned film where the producer will not share in future revenue, a fee of around 10% is common.
- Accessibility. Captions, transcripts and audio description are line items, not afterthoughts.
Tracking a multi-year documentary budget
Documentaries shoot in bursts, sometimes over years, so the approved budget has to keep working long after the first draft. In Saturation the template carries Estimate, Actual and Variance columns on every line: keep the approved numbers as the estimate, post actuals as each shoot block and edit month is paid, and watch variance by account rather than discovering it at picture lock. For funder and executive producer reports, paid plans export the budget to Excel (XLSX), CSV or PDF; full cost reports with estimate-to-final-cost (EFC) tracking are on Saturation's Pro plan and above.
More on the money side: documentary funding, documentary grants and how a production cost report works. Making docs full time? See Saturation for documentary producers.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a documentary cost to make?
There is no standard figure. IDA's guide notes that projects often start from a fixed assumption, from $20,000 of self-financed hard costs to $1.5 million from a global platform, and its own detailed sample budget is for a $1.3 million documentary at full professional rates. Build your budget from your story, shoot days, archive needs and edit length, then check it against what you can realistically raise.
How much contingency should a documentary budget include?
IDA puts it at typically 6% to 10%. If a funder does not allow a contingency line, protect yourself inside the individual lines instead.
Do I need E&O insurance for a documentary?
Usually, if you plan to distribute. E&O covers claims such as copyright infringement, invasion of privacy and defamation, and insurers often want an opinion letter from a clearance attorney on any fair use material, so start early.
Can I get this documentary budget template in Excel?
The template opens in Saturation, and on a paid plan you can export the budget to Excel (XLSX), CSV or PDF whenever you need a file for a grant application or a funder.
Is this the Hot Docs or IDA budget format?
No. This is Saturation's documentary template. If a fund requires the Hot Docs layout, use our Hot Docs template. IDA publishes its own free Excel budget and schedule template with its guide.
Is the template free?
Yes, on Saturation's free Creator plan, which includes budgeting and actualizing and the public templates.
Open this template in Saturation
Every template lands in a live budget: auto-fill the line items, set your phases and rate packs, and let fringes and reports follow the numbers.
Budget Engine 2.0
Your budget, your cost report and every export run on one engine.
Auto-fill
Rates fill in as you type, from the source you turned on.
PhasesRebuilt
Every column knows its type.
Reports
Drag blocks onto the page and split a row in two.
Rate packs
Verified union rates, versioned.
Fringes and markupsRebuilt
Stack them, cap them, and see the split on every line.
