Calculators
Hardwood and laminate flooring calculators
Solid, engineered and laminate planks, underlayment, fasteners, plank layout, refinishing and expansion gaps.
Wood and laminate floors are sold in cartons, and a carton is a bundle of random-length boards that covers a labelled area, usually around 20 square feet. The quantity question is therefore the same as for tile, but the waste is different in kind: besides the cuts at the walls, you lose boards to grade. A rustic grade with knots and colour variation has more boards you will not want in the middle of the room, and a narrow, long room with the planks run across it has far more end cuts than the same room run lengthways.
The calculators in this group take the carton coverage from the label, the waste from the grade and the layout, and give whole cartons. Around them sit the smaller quantities that are easy to forget until the floor is half down: underlayment rolls, cleats or staples by the nailing schedule, the width of the last row, and how much the floor will move with the seasons, which decides the gap you leave and whether a long run needs a transition.
8 calculators
Hardwood Flooring Calculator
Cartons of solid hardwood from the floor area, the carton coverage, the grade and the layout.
Engineered Wood Flooring Calculator
Cartons of engineered plank plus the underlayment, adhesive or cleats the installation method needs.
Laminate Flooring Calculator
Boxes and planks of laminate from the box coverage and the layout, with the underlayment rolls.
Underlayment Calculator
Rolls of foam, felt, cork or paper underlayment, the seam tape and a vapor barrier for a slab.
Flooring Cleats & Nails Calculator
Cleats or staples for a nailed floor from the board length, the spacing and the two at each board end.
Plank Layout Calculator
Rows of plank, the last-row width, whether to rip the first row, and the end-joint stagger.
Floor Sanding & Refinishing Calculator
Belts and edger discs per grit, dust bags and the hours a drum or orbital sanding job takes.
Expansion Gap Calculator
The gap to leave at the walls by material and climate, and where a long run needs a T-moulding.
Guides for this topic
Expansion gaps: how wide, where, and why floors buckle
Every floor moves. The gap at the walls is the room it moves into, and a floor without one buckles, cracks or lifts. Here are the gaps for each type and the arithmetic behind them.
Hardwood vs engineered wood vs laminate: cost, life and quantities
Three floors that can look alike are built very differently. Solid wood lasts generations and costs most; engineered wood goes where solid cannot; laminate costs least and is replaced, not refinished.
Buying luxury vinyl plank: boxes, wear layer, pad and price
Vinyl plank is the easiest floor to buy wrong, because boxes, thicknesses and wear layers vary so much. Here is what to read on the label and how to turn a room into boxes.
Which way to run planks, and how to avoid a thin last row
Plank direction is a choice about light, joists and the longest view. The last row is arithmetic, and it is the one you should do before laying the first plank.
Refinishing a hardwood floor: grits, sandpaper, time and finish
A worn wood floor can look new again for a fraction of the cost of replacing it. The job is mostly sanding, and the sanding is mostly arithmetic: area, grits, abrasive life and time.
Underlayment: which type, how many rolls, and when you need none
Underlayment smooths small flaws, softens footfall, cuts noise and keeps slab moisture out. The right one depends on the floor above and the subfloor below, and sometimes the right one is none.
Questions people ask
- How many cartons of hardwood for 300 square feet?
- With 20 sq ft per carton and a 10% allowance for a select grade laid straight, 300 sq ft becomes 330 sq ft, which is 16.5 cartons, so you buy 17. A character or rustic grade, or a diagonal layout, pushes the allowance to 15% and the order to 18 cartons.
- What waste factor should I use for hardwood flooring?
- The National Wood Flooring Association and most manufacturers suggest 5% for a clear or select grade in a simple room, 10% as a general figure, and 15% for lower grades, diagonal layouts or rooms with many angles. Herringbone and chevron patterns run to 20%.
- How many rolls of underlayment do I need?
- Divide the floor area by the roll coverage and round up. A 100 sq ft roll covers a 10 × 10 ft room with no spare, so a 12 × 14 ft room (168 sq ft) needs 2 rolls, and a 200 sq ft roll does it in one with 32 sq ft left for the closet. Add a few percent if the seams must overlap rather than butt.
- How many cleats or staples per square foot of flooring?
- For 2 1/4 inch strip nailed every 8 inches with two fasteners within 2 inches of each end, the count works out to roughly 10 to 12 cleats per sq ft; 5 inch plank at the same spacing takes about half that. A 500 sq ft floor of 3 1/4 inch strip needs around 4,000 cleats, which is four boxes of 1,000.
- How big should the expansion gap be?
- Most solid wood manufacturers call for a gap equal to the thickness of the flooring, about 3/4 inch, at every wall and fixed object. Laminate and luxury vinyl plank usually specify 1/4 to 3/8 inch and cap the length of an unbroken run at 30 to 40 feet, after which a T-moulding is needed. The expansion gap calculator applies the material's figures to your room.
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