A weighted decision matrix turns a messy, gut-feel choice into a clear, ranked comparison. List the options you are weighing up, decide which criteria actually matter, give each criterion a weight, then score every option on every criterion. The tool does the arithmetic for you: it normalises each rating, applies the weights, and reports a single 0-100 score per option along with an overall ranked winner. It is useful for buying decisions (which laptop, which flat, which supplier), hiring shortlists, product trade-offs, vendor selection, or any choice where several factors pull in different directions and a simple pros-and-cons list is not enough.
How it works
The model is a classic weighted-sum (also called a Pugh or weighted scoring model). Every criterion gets a weight reflecting how much it matters relative to the others, and every option gets a raw rating on a scale you pick (0-5, 0-7 or 0-10). For each cell the tool divides the rating by the scale maximum to get a 0-to-1 value, multiplies by the criterion weight, and divides by the sum of all weights. Summing across every criterion gives a normalised total scaled to 0-100, so options stay comparable however many criteria you add. Cost criteria — where lower is genuinely better, like price, risk or effort — are inverted automatically when you flag them, so you can mix “higher is better” and “lower is better” factors in one grid. The highest total is ranked first and the winner is highlighted in the grid, the banner and the ranking bars.
Example
Suppose you are choosing a laptop and weight Price highest (5), then Performance (4), Battery (3) and Build (2). You mark Price as a cost criterion because a cheaper machine should score better. Option A rates 2 on price (expensive) but 5 on battery; Option C rates 5 on price (cheap) but only 3 on performance. After weighting, the tool might rank the balanced Option A first at 78/100, Option C second at 71/100 and the powerful but costly Option B third. Adjust a single weight slider and the ranking updates instantly, so you can stress-test how sensitive the decision is to your assumptions.
| Option | Price (cost) | Performance | Battery | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ultrabook | 2 | 4 | 5 | 78.0 |
| Budget pick | 5 | 3 | 3 | 71.0 |
| Workstation | 4 | 5 | 2 | 69.0 |
Everything runs in your browser and saves automatically, so you can come back later, tweak the weights, and re-export the updated table to CSV, Markdown or JSON.