DAT has 400,000 carriers. You're not competing with the market — you're competing with 400,000 versions of yourself looking at the same loads. Here's what the number actually looks like when you run it properly.
The Real Comparison
Most operators have never added up what a load board actually costs them. Here it is, category by category — with the numbers that change the answer.
Load board: $200–400/month in subscriptions. Dispatch: ~$900/month at 6% on $15K gross. But dispatch also replaces the subscription AND the 50-65 hours you were spending searching and calling.
Load board: 2–3 hours a day searching, calling, following up, and negotiating — 50–65 hours a month of work that doesn't pay you directly. Dispatch: zero. You drive, we handle everything else.
Self-dispatched dry van industry average: $2.00–2.20/mile. TruckLeap dispatched drivers: $2.40–2.60/mile on comparable lanes. $0.30–0.40/mile gap doesn't sound like much until you multiply it by 10,000 miles.
Your personal contacts: probably 20–50 brokers you've called before. TruckLeap: 200+ broker relationships built over years of consistent volume. More relationships means freight before it gets posted — not after.
Load board: you find your next load after you deliver. Dispatch: we start working your next load 4–6 hours before you arrive at delivery. The difference shows up in your deadhead percentage every month.
Load board on 10K miles: ~$19,600–21,600 net. TruckLeap dispatch on 10K miles: ~$22,560–24,440 net. Average improvement: $2,500–3,000/month — after the dispatch fee.
Free Tools
The Real Numbers
The load board vs. dispatch comparison starts with subscriptions and ends there for most people. That's the wrong place to stop. DAT runs $65–$200/month by tier. Truckstop is $150–$500. Two boards — which is what most serious operators carry — runs $215–$700/month before you make your first call. Then add the time: 2.5–4 hours a day on search, broker calls, paperwork, and follow-up. At $35/hour, that's $1,925–$3,080/month in time cost that shows up as exhaustion and stress rather than a line item on your bank statement. Combined, the real cost of self-dispatching via load board runs $2,100–$3,700/month — before you account for a single dollar of rate differential.
That's where it really breaks open. Dispatched carriers average $0.18–$0.35/mile more than self-dispatched carriers running comparable lanes. At 10,000 miles a month, that's $1,800–$3,500 in revenue that self-dispatched operators leave behind — not by running fewer miles, but by accepting rates the market would have paid more for if they'd had the relationships and the data to push. A 6% dispatch fee on $12,000 gross costs you $720. If the dispatcher gets you $0.18/mile more, you net $1,080 more than you paid in fees. That's before the subscriptions you cancel and the 50 hours a month you get back.
There's also a structural reality about what's actually on public load boards. Freight that gets posted publicly has usually been offered to trusted carriers first. The loads you see on DAT are what brokers couldn't book through their primary networks — or freight that nobody with a direct relationship wanted. Dispatchers with 200+ broker relationships get calls before postings, which means they're working 25–35% of the brokered freight market that never appears in a public search. If your only access to freight is what gets posted, you're starting every day already behind.
Common Questions
Apply in 5 minutes. No setup fees. We start working your lanes within 48 hours.
Apply Now — Free Setup