Square footage, waste, and boxes or carpet roll feet for hardwood, laminate, vinyl plank, tile, or carpet across any number of rooms.
| Room | Size | Area | Boxes (share) |
|---|
| Material | Box coverage | Buy | Covers |
|---|
This flooring calculator adds up any number of rooms, applies the waste factor the layout needs, and converts the total into what you actually buy: boxes for hardwood, laminate, luxury vinyl plank, and tile, or linear feet of 12-foot roll for carpet. Pick a material and the typical box coverage fills in (hardwood 20 sq ft, laminate 22, LVP 24, tile 15), or type the coverage printed on the box you are considering. It also counts underlayment rolls, transition strips for doorways, and turns a price per square foot or per box into a material cost estimate. It is for homeowners pricing a flooring project room by room, comparing materials on the same rooms, and checking that a store quote has not padded the waste.
Each room's area is length x width; the rooms are summed. Waste is added as a percentage: 10 percent for a straight layout (cuts at walls, damaged planks, one spare box for repairs) or 15 percent for diagonal, herringbone, or rooms with many angles. Boxes = ceiling(total area with waste / box coverage), because you cannot buy part of a box. Carpet comes on 12 ft wide rolls, so for each room the calculator tries both orientations, ceiling(width / 12) strips x length and ceiling(length / 12) strips x width, takes the shorter, adds waste, and reports linear feet and the square feet that represents. Underlayment is figured at 100 sq ft per roll over the raw room area; transitions default to one per room. Cost = boxes x price per box, or area with waste x price per sq ft, whichever price you enter. Metric mode converts meters to feet internally and reports square meters.
Ten percent is the standard allowance for a straight, parallel-to-the-wall layout in a simple rectangular room: it covers end cuts, boards with defects, and a few spares for future repairs. Use 15 percent for diagonal or herringbone patterns, rooms with many closets, angles, or islands, and for tile with a strong directional pattern. Very large open areas with few cuts can get by on 7 to 8 percent, but never round down to a box you might be short.
It varies by product, which is why the box coverage field is editable. Typical figures: solid and engineered hardwood 18 to 24 sq ft, laminate 20 to 26, luxury vinyl plank 20 to 30, 12 x 12 in tile 10 to 15, and 12 x 24 in tile 14 to 16. The number is printed on the box and on the store's product page. Enter that exact figure before you rely on the box count, since one box either way can be the difference between finishing and a second trip.
Carpet is sold from 12 ft (sometimes 13.5 or 15 ft) wide rolls and cut to length, so the price is per linear foot or per square yard and the waste depends on how the room fits the roll width. A 12 x 15 ft room takes a single 15 ft cut with no seam; a 14 x 16 ft room needs two strips and a seam, and one orientation wastes less than the other. The calculator checks both orientations for every room and reports the shorter total in linear feet, then converts to square feet and square yards.
Laminate and most floating vinyl plank need a thin foam or felt underlayment for sound and moisture unless the product has a pad attached. Nail-down hardwood goes over rosin paper or a synthetic underlayment; glue-down LVP and tile do not use one (tile uses thinset over a suitable substrate). Carpet uses a separate carpet pad, usually sold in 6 ft wide rolls. Underlayment rolls commonly cover 100 sq ft, which is the figure this calculator uses.
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