Turn length, width and depth into cubic yards for ordering concrete, gravel, soil or mulch.
Cubic Yard Calculator
Inputs
Depth is in inches — the most common ordering mistake is entering feet here.
Results
Volume
2.47 yd³
V = length × width × (depth ÷ 12), then ÷ 27 for cubic yards
Calculated with BuildCalculators.com
A cubic yard is the unit almost every bulk material is sold in — concrete, gravel, topsoil, mulch, sand. It is a cube three feet on every side: 27 cubic feet. The calculation is always the same three steps: area in square feet, times depth in feet, divided by 27.
The trap is the depth. You measure a bed or a slab in feet, but you specify its depth in inches, and the two units meet in one formula. Every consequential mistake with this calculation — an order twelve times too big, a delivery that covers a third of the bed — is a units mistake, not an arithmetic one.
V = length(ft) × width(ft) × (depth(in) ÷ 12)yd³ = ft³ ÷ 27m³ = ft³ ÷ 35.315order = yd³ × (1 + waste ÷ 100)yd³ = ft² × (depth(in) ÷ 12) ÷ 27Three feet by three feet by three feet is 27 cubic feet — one cubic yard. Geometry gives you cubic feet; suppliers sell cubic yards; the division bridges them on every single order. Skip it and the answer is 27 times too large, which is at least obvious. The subtler version is dividing by 9 out of habit from square yards, which leaves the answer three times too large — big enough to be expensive, small enough to look plausible.
Because materials are specified that way: a 4 inch slab, 3 inches of mulch, a 6 inch base. The calculator divides by 12 internally. Entering depth in feet — 4 instead of 0.333 — is the classic error in the other direction, and it produces an order twelve times too large. The field is labelled inches for exactly this reason.
A square yard measures surface; a cubic yard measures volume, and one cubic yard covers a different area at every depth: 324 ft² at one inch deep, 81 ft² at four inches, 27 ft² at a foot. When a landscaper says "yards" they almost always mean cubic yards. The coverage table below turns that into numbers you can order against.
Ten percent covers spillage, uneven ground and the material that stays stuck in the truck or wheelbarrow. It does not cover compaction: gravel and crushed stone settle 15–20% when compacted, which is a separate physical effect with its own allowance. For base material under a slab or driveway, use the gravel calculator on this site, which handles compaction explicitly.
The standard small project: a parking pad or shed base.
Order 3 cubic yards
Most suppliers sell in whole or half yards — 2.72 rounds to 3. For gravel that will be compacted, the right figure is higher; see the gravel calculator.
Building up soil depth before seeding — deep enough that the volume surprises people.
Order 10 cubic yards
Ten yards of topsoil is roughly ten tons — two truckloads for many suppliers. Ordering in one go usually saves a second delivery fee.
A planting bed along a fence, mulched to the standard depth.
0.74 yd³ — about 10 bags
Below roughly a yard, bagged material competes with bulk once you count the delivery fee. The mulch calculator compares the two costs directly.
You already know the area — a measured lawn being topdressed — and only need the depth applied.
About 2.8 cubic yards
Any area from the square footage calculator drops straight into this formula — that is why the two tools are linked.
How far a yard spreads at each depth. Divide your area by the coverage to estimate yards.
| Depth | Coverage per yd³ |
|---|---|
| 1 in | 324 ft² |
| 2 in | 162 ft² |
| 3 in | 108 ft² |
| 4 in | 81 ft² |
| 6 in | 54 ft² |
| 12 in | 27 ft² |
Raw volume before waste.
| Depth | Per 100 ft² | Per 500 ft² | Per 1,000 ft² |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 in | 0.62 yd³ | 3.1 yd³ | 6.2 yd³ |
| 3 in | 0.93 yd³ | 4.6 yd³ | 9.3 yd³ |
| 4 in | 1.23 yd³ | 6.2 yd³ | 12.3 yd³ |
| 6 in | 1.85 yd³ | 9.3 yd³ | 18.5 yd³ |
Approximate, at typical moisture. Weight decides how it can be hauled.
| Material | Approx weight per yd³ |
|---|---|
| Mulch, bark | 400–800 lb |
| Compost | 1,000–1,600 lb |
| Topsoil, dry | 2,000–2,200 lb |
| Sand | 2,600–3,000 lb |
| Gravel, loose | 2,400–2,900 lb |
| Crushed stone | 2,700–3,000 lb |
| Concrete, in place | about 4,050 lb |
| Condition | Allowance |
|---|---|
| Level, contained area (raised bed, forms) | 5% |
| Typical yard project | 10% |
| Uneven or sloping ground | 10–15% |
| Spread by hand over a large area | 15% |
Bulk material pricing has two halves: the material per cubic yard, and the delivery to get it to you. For small quantities the delivery fee often costs more than the material, which is what makes the bagged-versus-bulk decision worth a minute of arithmetic.
Ranges below are national US figures for 2026, for material delivered in bulk. Local pits and yards vary widely — topsoil in particular is cheap near farmland and expensive in cities.
Typical delivered ranges: topsoil $30–$60, screened and amended soil up to $75, bark mulch $30–$70, sand $30–$55, gravel and crushed stone $40–$75, decorative rock $60–$150 and up. Concrete is its own market at $140–$180 per yard delivered — see the concrete calculator for how short-load fees change that picture.
Commonly $50–$150 per trip depending on distance, and often free above a threshold — frequently 5 or 10 yards. This is why ordering 3 yards twice costs meaningfully more than 6 yards once, and why it pays to total up every bed and low spot before booking the truck.
A 2 ft³ bag of mulch runs $3–$7, so a cubic yard in bags is $40–$95 plus the trips to carry 13½ of them. Bulk wins on price above roughly half a yard — but bags win on logistics when there is no space to dump a loose pile, or when the material has to move through a house to a back garden.
A full-size pickup safely carries about 1 cubic yard of soil or ½ yard of gravel or sand — the limit is weight, not volume, as the weight table above shows. A 6 × 4 ft utility trailer holds about a yard of mulch but only a third of a yard of stone. Overloading is the expensive way to discover the difference between a heaped bed and a rated payload.
Because volume scales with depth, the cheapest saving is often half an inch of it. Mulch at 3 inches rather than 4 saves a quarter of the order with little practical difference; a lawn topdressed at ½ inch rather than 1 inch costs half as much. Decide the depth deliberately before pricing the material.
The field is inches. Typing 4 when you mean 4 inches is right; typing 0.33 because you converted first — and letting the calculator divide by 12 again — orders a twelfth of what you need. The reverse, thinking in feet and typing 4 for a 4 ft excavation, orders twelve times too much. Enter the number exactly as the depth is specified.
Carpet is sold by the square yard, soil by the cubic yard, and the words get shortened to "yards" in both trades. Dividing square feet by 9 gives square yards — a surface measure that says nothing about volume. If a "yards" figure was produced without a depth anywhere in the calculation, it is the wrong kind of yard.
Gravel and crushed stone compact 15–20% when plate-compacted, so a 4 inch finished base needs nearly 5 inches of loose material. The waste allowance here does not model that — it covers spillage. For driveway and slab bases, use the gravel or crushed stone calculator, where compaction is a separate, explicit input.
Topdressing an existing bed only needs the top-up depth, not the full bed depth — mulching beds that already hold an inch of old mulch at a full 3 inches over-orders by half. Probe a few spots, average what is there, and order the difference.
Ground is not flat and spreading is not perfect. An order with no allowance runs out in the far corner, and a second delivery of half a yard carries the same fee as the first five. The 10% default exists because it is nearly always cheaper than the second truck.
The delivery fee is per trip, not per yard. Totalling the mulch, the topsoil low spots and the path gravel into one measured list — and one or two deliveries — routinely saves $50–$100 on a weekend of yard work. This calculator plus a notepad is the whole method.
27. A cubic yard is 3 ft × 3 ft × 3 ft. To convert cubic feet to cubic yards, divide by 27.
Multiply the square footage by the depth in feet, then divide by 27. For a depth given in inches, divide the inches by 12 first. A 200 ft² area at 4 in deep is 200 × 0.333 ÷ 27, or 2.47 cubic yards.
It depends on the material. Loose gravel is about 2,800 lb per cubic yard, concrete about 4,050 lb, and dry topsoil around 2,000 lb. Weight matters for delivery limits, so check with your supplier.
Yes. Most suppliers sell in whole or half cubic yards, and running short mid-pour is far more expensive than a little surplus. The waste allowance in this calculator handles normal spillage; round the result up on top of it.
How to Calculate Concrete for a Slab — Length × width × thickness, ÷ 27, plus waste. Four steps, two unit conversions, and one worked example you can follow with a pencil.
Embed the Cubic Yard Calculator anywhere — it is free, stays in sync with this page, and sizes itself to fit. The only condition is the credit line in the snippet, which links your readers to the full version with the formulas and worked examples.
This calculator uses published constants from named industry sources, each asserted in an automated test that runs on every build. The formula is printed with the result above, and any correction we make is logged on the changelog.
It is a planning estimate. It does not replace an engineer, a site visit or a written quote — confirm quantities with your supplier before ordering.