Construction & Home
For anyone ordering material by the yard, the sheet or the bag. Every calculator here ends in a quantity you can hand to a supplier — cubic yards, bundles, sheets, studs — and each carries the waste allowance separately, because the allowance is the number that decides whether you make a second trip.
Materials, layout and framing. Every calculator here returns the number you order in — board feet, cubic yards, bundles, sheets — with the waste factor built into the calculation rather than left as an exercise.
Lumber & framing
- Board Foot CalculatorConvert lumber dimensions to board feet and price out a cut list, including nominal-vs-actual sizing.
- Stair CalculatorRiser height, tread count, total run and stringer length from a total rise — checked against the code limits.
- Deck Board CalculatorDecking boards, joists and fasteners for a rectangular deck, accounting for the gap between boards.
- Stud CalculatorStuds and plate lumber for a framed wall at 16 or 24 in on centre, including corners and openings.
- Feet and Inches CalculatorConvert to feet and inches, or add, subtract, multiply and divide feet-and-inches measurements, with the rounding error shown beside the fraction.
Concrete & masonry
- Concrete CalculatorCubic yards of concrete for a slab, round pad, footing, column, wall or stairs, with bag counts and cost.
- Gravel & Aggregate CalculatorCubic yards and tons of gravel, sand, limestone or topsoil for an area at a given depth.
- Brick CalculatorBricks and mortar for a wall, by brick size — modular, queen, king or utility. Includes the mortar bags and the masonry sand, at about 125 bricks a bag.
- Cubic Yard CalculatorCubic yards for any footprint and depth, with a waste allowance and the weight of the debris if you are hauling it away.
- Concrete Block CalculatorBlocks, mortar and fill for a concrete block wall, from its length and height. Blocks, courses, mortar and the concrete it takes to fill the cores.
- Asphalt CalculatorTons of hot-mix asphalt for a driveway or lot at a given compacted thickness, with the density the mix is actually sold at.
- Rebar CalculatorBars, total length and weight of reinforcement for a slab at a given grid spacing, with the lap length the code requires.
Surfaces & finishes
- Square Footage CalculatorSquare footage of a room, wall, border, gable end, ring or triangle from feet-and-inches measurements, with a waste factor and the cost.
- Paint CalculatorGallons of paint for a room, after subtracting doors and windows and allowing for the number of coats.
- Tile CalculatorHow many tiles and boxes to order for a floor or wall, with the waste factor the layout actually needs.
- Drywall CalculatorSheets of drywall for a room, plus the screws, tape and joint compound to finish it. Screws, tape and compound too, with the ceiling counted separately.
- Mulch CalculatorCubic yards and bags of mulch for a bed, with a waste allowance and a warning when the depth would smother the roots.
- Material Weight CalculatorWhat a volume of gravel, sand, topsoil or mulch weighs, and what a weight takes up, so tons quoted by a supplier can be checked against yards measured on site.
Roofing & exterior
- Roofing CalculatorRoofing squares and shingle bundles from the building footprint and the roof pitch. Applies the pitch multiplier, so it is roof area, not footprint.
- Fence CalculatorPosts, rails, pickets and concrete for a run of fence at a given post spacing. Sections, posts, rails, pickets and the two bags of concrete each post takes.
- Siding CalculatorSquares of siding for a house from its wall dimensions, with openings deducted and waste added.
Interior
- Insulation CalculatorBags or batts of insulation for an attic or a wall, from the area and the R-value you are aiming at.
- Laminate Flooring CalculatorBoxes of laminate, vinyl plank or engineered flooring for a room, with the waste a plank floor actually needs.
- BTU CalculatorThe cooling or heating capacity a room needs, from its size and the things that change the answer — sun, ceiling height, occupants and a kitchen.
Landscaping
Outdoor & landscaping
Electrical
Flooring
HVAC & energy
Reference charts
- Concrete for a 10 × 10 Slab by Thickness — 11 rows
- Roof Pitch Multiplier Chart — 24 rows
- Gravel Tonnage by Depth Chart — 12 rows
- Asphalt Tonnage by Thickness Chart — 11 rows
- Rebar Grid Spacing Chart — 10 rows
- CFM by Room Size Chart — 12 rows
Guides
- How to Read a Tape Measure — Why the marks are different lengths, and how to read a sixteenth without counting them: each halving is drawn one step shorter than the one above it.
- How to Measure a Room for Flooring — Where to hold the tape, how to split an odd shape into rectangles rather than one clever polygon, and how much extra to order once the offcuts are counted.
- What a Concrete Patio Costs — Materials, delivery and labour for a slab, and where the price actually moves: on a small pour the concrete is rarely the largest of the three figures.
- What a Deck Costs to Build — Decking, framing and fasteners priced out, and why the board decides the total: the framing under it barely changes between a cheap deck and a costly one.
- What a Shingle Roof Costs — Squares, bundles, tear-off and the pitch multiplier that makes a steep roof cost more twice over — once for the area, once for the labour of standing on it.
- What a Fence Costs — Post spacing, the ground-contact rating most people buy wrong, and why corners and gates cost more per foot than the long straight runs between them.
- What Drywalling a Room Costs — Sheets, screws, and the finish level that decides most of the labour bill while appearing on no quote — level 4 and level 5 are not the same job.
- What a Gravel Driveway Costs — Which stone actually compacts, how deep each layer goes, and why the cheapest load is the expensive one once it has to be dug out and replaced two years later.