Free Tool
Pick your material, enter the area and depth, and get exact cubic yards, tons, and bags to order — with a waste allowance built in. Covers mulch, topsoil, compost, sand, gravel, river rock, concrete, sod, seed, and fertilizer.
Volume materials use cubic yards = ft² × depth ÷ 324
Cubic yards = area × depth(in) ÷ 324, plus waste. Tons use typical material density — confirm with your supplier. Bags are rounded up.
No more guessing at the garden center or paying for a second delivery. Enter your bed size and depth and know exactly how many yards, tons, or bags to buy.
Turn a measured area into a materials order on the spot, add your price for an instant cost, and quote with confidence. In ServicePros Hub, the result drops straight into a proposal.
For bulk materials, everything comes back to one landscape formula: cubic yards = area × depth ÷ 324.
The 324 converts square feet at a given depth in inches into cubic yards (12 in/ft × 27 ft³/yd ÷ 12 = 324). Enter your area and how deep you want the material, and the calculator adds your waste allowance (10% is typical) so you don't come up short.
It also converts yards to tons using each material's typical density (mulch is light, gravel is heavy) and to bags using standard bag sizes — handy when a small job is cheaper bagged than delivered. Sod is estimated in rolls and pallets; seed and fertilizer by the pound at your application rate. Always confirm exact weights with your supplier.
Multiply the bed area (ft²) by the depth in inches, divide by 324, and add ~10% for waste to get cubic yards. For example, 500 ft² at 3 inches deep is about 4.6 cubic yards. This calculator does it for you and also shows bags and tons.
A cubic yard is 27 cubic feet, so it takes about 13.5 bags of a 2-cubic-foot product (or 54 bags of a 0.5 ft³ product) to equal one yard. The calculator rounds bags up to whole units.
Mulch is usually applied 2–4 inches deep (3 is common); gravel and crushed stone 2–3 inches for a walkable layer; topsoil 4+ inches for new beds or leveling. Adjust the depth field to your job.
Cubic yards = square feet × depth in inches ÷ 324. The 324 factor bakes in the inches-to-feet and feet-to-yards conversions, so you can go straight from an area measurement to a yardage order.
It varies by material: mulch is roughly 0.3 tons per yard, topsoil ~1.15, gravel ~1.45, sand ~1.35. The calculator applies these typical densities, but confirm exact figures with your supplier before ordering by weight.
This calculator is one of the trade tools inside ServicePros Hub — proposals, scheduling, invoicing, and card payments for home-service pros. One flat price. No tiers, no add-ons.
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