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Soil Calculator

Raised-bed interior fill, soil bags and bulk volume.

Your project

Enter your measurements. Required fields are labeled; assumptions and optional quotes can be edited below.

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Calculator inputs
Interior Length Required
Enter whole feet and inches less than 12. One blank component means 0.
Interior Width Required
Enter whole feet and inches less than 12. One blank component means 0.
Additional fill depth Required
Use a decimal point. Complete or clear an unfinished measurement before changing its units.

Raised beds use interior dimensions. Enter only the still-unfilled depth, not exterior bed height. No wall thickness is inferred.

Allowance
0–50%. Optional extra material volume. No automatic settling or compaction factor is applied.
Material options

Applied preset: US-market. No assumptions changed. Display units do not select a market preset.

Actual labeled volume of one bag, in ft³. Supported range: 0.035–35.315 ft³.
Optional cost
Optional quote in USD per bag. Zero is valid. Two decimals for direct prices; converted rates allow up to six decimals. Excludes tax, delivery and labor.

How this calculator works

Use interior length and width for a raised bed, ordinary dimensions for a rectangle, or a known measured area. Enter only the depth of new soil still needed. A partly filled bed needs only its remaining unfilled depth. Raised-bed and rectangle modes use the same prism geometry; no exterior-to-interior conversion or wall thickness is inferred.

Volume formulaBase = interior area × additional fill depth; required = base × (1 + allowance / 100); bags = ceilSafe(required / bag volume).

Assumptions and limitations

The entered soil mix is treated as one product, with no recipe or component split. Use the supplier’s labeled volume. A bag sold only by mass needs a supplier-provided volume; no density or bag-weight conversion is inferred. US-market defaults to 1 ft³; the explicit Metric-market preset selects 40 L. Display changes preserve the bag physically. The explicit reserve and package surplus are separate. Bulk quotes use continuous required volume; bag prices never contribute to bulk cost. Costs exclude tax, delivery and labor.

Worked examples

An interior 8 × 4 ft bed needing 12 in of new soil has a 32 ft³ base. With 10% reserve, it needs 35.2 ft³, or 1.3037037037 yd³. With 1 ft³ bags, 36 bags leave 0.8 ft³ surplus. At $5/bag, cost is $180.00.

An interior 2 × 1 m bed needing 30 cm of new soil and no reserve needs 0.6 m³, or 600 L. With 40 L bags, it needs 15 bags. At $7/bag, cost is $105.00. A separate $80/m³ bulk quote instead gives $48.00.

These are reference examples. Your estimate uses only the measurements and assumptions you enter above.

Read the calculation methodology