How to Calculate Pavers for a Patio in 5 Simple Steps

Pavers in one line

Pavers are simple: patio area, divided by the area of one paver, plus waste, rounded up to whole pavers. A 14 ft by 12 ft patio is 168 square feet, one 12 inch paver covers 1 square foot, so the patio needs 168 pavers exact, and with 10% waste for cuts that becomes 185 pavers. The rest of this guide is about getting those three inputs honest: the patio size, the paver size, and the waste.

Step 1: Measure the patio, length and width

Measure the patio in feet, length and width, at the ground itself — not at a plan nearby, since patios are built to the ground, not to the drawing. The worked example is 14 ft long and 12 ft wide, a common backyard patio, and 14 times 12 is 168 square feet. If the patio is not a rectangle, split it into rectangles, measure each one, and add the areas: an L-shaped patio is two rectangles, and the pavers follow the total area, not the longest side.

Step 2: Work out the area of one paver

Work out the area of one paver in square feet, since the patio is measured in feet and the paver is sold in inches. A square paver 12 inches wide is 1 foot wide, so one paver covers 1 square foot; a 6 inch paver covers only a quarter of a square foot, and a 24 inch paver covers 4 square feet. Do not skip this step: dividing square feet by inches without converting buys for a patio a twelfth of the size, and the shortfall shows up at the last corner.

Step 3: Divide the patio by the paver

Divide the patio area by the area of one paver for the exact count. The example patio is 168 square feet and one paver is 1 square foot, so 168 divided by 1 is 168 pavers exact. A smaller paver changes this step most: the same patio at 6 inch pavers needs 672 pavers exact, since every paver covers a quarter of the ground, while at 24 inch pavers it needs only 42, since every paver covers four square feet.

Step 4: Add waste and round up

Add the waste for cuts and breakages, then round up to whole pavers, since pavers are sold by the paver. Ten percent on the example is 168 times 1.10, or 184.8, rounded up to 185 pavers, and the spare pavers are not wasted — they are the pavers the edges and corners consume in cutting. Round up at the end, not at the start: rounding the patio area first and then dividing double-counts the rounding and over-orders.

Step 5: Buy, lay and check the patio

Buy the pavers — 185 for the example — and check the patio before laying them: every paver dry, the base level, the first row laid straight, since a first row laid crooked runs crooked across the whole patio. Then count what pavers do not cover: sand, edging and base. For the base under the patio, the sand calculator counts the base, so the patio and the base are ordered together, and the pavers are not bought for a base that was never counted.

Pavers in numbers

Suppose the patio is 14 ft long and 12 ft wide, the pavers are 12 inches square, and the waste is 10%. Patio area: 14 × 12 = 168 sq ft. Paver area: 1 sq ft. Pavers exact: 168 ÷ 1 = 168. Pavers with waste: 168 × 1.10 = 184.8. Pavers to buy: 185, rounded up. Order: 185 pavers, plus sand, edging and base bought separately.

Common mistakes

The most common mistake is dividing square feet by inches without converting, which buys for a patio a twelfth of the size. The second is forgetting the waste, which buys for a perfect patio and runs short at the first cut corner. The third is measuring only the longest side and forgetting the width, which buys for a strip instead of a patio. The fourth is rounding up before adding waste, which double-counts the rounding and over-orders. The fifth is forgetting the edging, which paves a patio and leaves the edges to wander.

Worked example, start to finish

A backyard patio, 14 ft long and 12 ft wide, 12 inch pavers, 10% waste. Patio area: 168 sq ft. Paver area: 1 sq ft. Pavers exact: 168. Pavers with waste: 184.8. Pavers to buy: 185. Result: buy 185 pavers, and buy sand, edging and base separately. If the same patio used 6 inch pavers instead, the need would rise to 740 pavers, but the patio paved would be identical.

What changes the answer most

The paver size changes the answer most: moving from 12 inch to 6 inch pavers quadruples the count, from 185 to 740, while the patio itself never changes. The patio area is second: every square foot of patio is another paver, and a wrong measurement rebuilds the whole order. The waste is third, and it changes only the top of the order, never the patio itself — moving from 10% to 15% waste still buys under 200 pavers, since 168 times 1.15 is 193.2. The patio shape is fourth, and it changes only the area, never the paver maths.

Frequently asked questions