CalculatorMulchGravel, stone and sand calculators
Aggregate is measured by the yard and sold by the ton. These four bridge the gap, one density at a time.
French drain gravel calculator
A trench full of gravel, minus the pipe sitting in the middle of it.
Paver base calculator
The layer that fails is never the one you can see.
Gravel calculator
Stone is priced by the ton and measured by the yard. The bridge between them is density.
Pea gravel calculator
Rounded stone that walks well at one depth and swallows your shoes at another.
River rock calculator
Coverage per ton drops fast as the stone gets bigger. That is the number the yard will not quote.
Sand calculator
Four jobs, four depths, and only one of them tolerates the cheap grade.
Stone is the group where the arithmetic changes unit twice. You measure a patio in square feet, calculate the order in cubic yards, and the supply yard sells you tons off a weighbridge โ and the conversion between the last two is different for every material on the pile. A cubic yard of pea gravel is 1.25 tons; the same yard of decomposed granite is 1.45. These calculators carry the right density for each, so the tonnage on your quote and the tonnage on the ticket agree.
Frequently asked questions
Why is stone sold by the ton instead of the cubic yard?
Because it is loaded by the bucket and weighed on a truck scale, which is far more accurate than judging a heaped yard by eye. It also means every quote needs a density to compare: at 2,700 lb per cubic yard a ton of crushed stone is 0.74 yards, so a per-ton price and a per-yard price are not close to the same thing.
Which stone goes where?
Angular crushed stone for anything structural โ driveways, paver bases, French drains โ because the faces lock together under load. Rounded pea gravel and river rock for decorative beds and drainage features where nothing drives or walks. Sand only as a thin screeded bedding layer, or in a sandbox.
How deep does each material go?
Two to three inches for decorative gravel over fabric, a 4-inch minimum for any surface a vehicle uses, 6 to 12 inches in a drainage trench, one inch of screeded bedding sand under pavers, and roughly two stone diameters for large river rock so the fabric stops showing through.
How we calculate this
Sources: