CategoriesLandscaping

Landscaping Calculators

Garden and landscape planning tools to calculate mulch, pine straw, and other organic materials. Perfect for any landscaping project.

13 Calculators

Any garden size

Always Free

Landscape materials are sold by weight or volume but spread by depth.

Mulch, soil, gravel and sand all follow the same arithmetic: area times depth gives volume, and volume times density gives the weight a supplier will actually charge you for. The depth is the decision that matters most, and it varies by purpose rather than preference. Two inches of mulch suppresses weeds; four inches smothers roots.

Bulk delivery beats bags on price once you pass roughly a cubic yard, which is about 13 bags of mulch or 27 bags of soil. Below that, the delivery fee dominates and bags win. Most suppliers also have a free-delivery threshold, so ordering slightly more can genuinely cost less in total.

Settle this before you calculate

Depth by purpose: 2 to 3 inches for mulch on beds, 4 to 6 inches of compacted gravel for a driveway base, 6 to 12 inches of topsoil for a new lawn or raised bed.
Area in real shapes: Break curved beds into rectangles and triangles rather than guessing. A 10% area error becomes a 10% material error.
Compaction, if it is a base: Gravel and fill settle. Aggregate bases lose 20 to 30% of loose volume once compacted, so order against compacted depth.

Where the estimate goes wrong

Mulching too deep against trunks: Keep mulch 2 to 3 inches deep and pulled back from stems. Piling it into a volcano around a trunk holds moisture against bark and kills the tree slowly.
Ordering by bag count from a photo: Bag sizes are not standard. Mulch is usually 2 cubic feet, soil often 1 or 1.5. Convert to cubic yards before comparing prices.
Ignoring the delivery fee in the per-yard price: A flat $75 delivery on 1 yard doubles the cost per yard. On 5 yards it adds 15%. Work out the delivered price, not the material price.