Flooring calculator
Area to buy and boxes of laminate, vinyl, wood or carpet
Type the room size and the coverage printed on one box. The example is a 15 x 12 ft room with boxes of 20 sq ft.
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- Boxes
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- Room area
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- In square yards (carpet)
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- Left over
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An estimate of quantity from the sizes you typed, not an order list or a price. Follow the maker's installation guide for gaps, underlay and acclimatising.
How the amount is worked out
- Room area = length x width.
- Area to buy = room area plus the allowance for cuts.
- Boxes = area to buy / the coverage of one box, rounded up.
Each box of laminate, vinyl plank or engineered wood says how much floor it covers. Type that figure. Boxes are sold whole, so the last box usually leaves some spare.
Why add extra
Planks are cut at every wall, and around doors, pipes and corners. Off-cuts can often start the next row, but not always. Diagonal and herringbone layouts cut far more. A few spare planks from the same batch are also handy for repairs later.
Worked example
A room 15 ft x 12 ft is 180 sq ft. Add 10%: 198 sq ft. At 20 sq ft per box that is 9.9, so 10 boxes, which cover 200 sq ft and leave 2 sq ft spare.
Carpet
Carpet and sheet vinyl come off a roll of fixed width, often 12 ft (3.66 m) in the US, and 4 or 5 m in the UK and Australia. The amount you buy depends on how the widths fit the room and where the seams go, so the square-yard figure here is the floor area only. Ask the retailer to plan the cut.
Odd shapes
Add up an L-shaped room with the square footage calculator, then type it as a length with a width of 1. For tiles, the tile calculator counts pieces with grout gaps.
Defaults and where they come from
Every default is only a starting point. Change any box to match what you are buying or building.
| Default | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Allowance for cuts | 10% straight (usual 5 to 10%); about 15% diagonal; 20% or more herringbone | Common practice in flooring makers' installation guides and retailer advice. The US National Wood Flooring Association's grading standard allows up to 5% off-grade pieces, which is a different thing from cutting waste. No standard sets a cutting figure. |
| Coverage of one box | 20 sq ft (1.858 m² after conversion) | An example only: box coverage varies by product. Use the figure printed on your box. |
| Conversions | 1 sq yd = 9 sq ft; 1 sq ft = 0.09290304 m² | Exact definitions. |