How many pavers do I need for a 20x14 patio?

About 1,330 8 by 4 in pavers with a 1/8 in joint and 10% waste. The joint matters: each paver plus its joint occupies 0.232 sq ft rather than the 0.222 sq ft the paver alone measures.

How deep should the base be for a paver patio?

Commonly 4 to 6 in of compacted base for a pedestrian patio, more for poor soil, poor drainage or vehicle traffic. It is a soil and climate question rather than a universal figure, so this page treats it as an input and will not publish one number.

How much does a paver patio cost per square foot?

Lawn Love published $8 to $24 per square foot installed in December 2025, with materials $3 to $30 and labour $5 to $15. This site publishes no price of its own; those are somebody else's figures, attributed and dated, and paving is a trade where local labour rates move the total a lot.

How much soil do I need to remove for a patio?

Area times total excavation depth, divided by 324 to get cubic yards. A 280 sq ft patio dug 9.4 in deep is 8.1 cubic yards, which is a skip and a half and a real cost line.

Do I need edge restraint?

Yes, along every open edge. Without it the perimeter pavers migrate outward, the joints open and the field loses its interlock. It is the cheapest part of the job and the most commonly skipped.

What waste allowance should I use for pavers?

Ten percent on a plain rectangle. More where the patio has curves, a soldier or border course, or a herringbone pattern, all of which need cut pavers around the edge and produce offcuts that do not fit anywhere else.

Is polymeric sand different from bedding sand?

Yes, and both are needed. Bedding sand is the levelling layer under the pavers. Polymeric sand goes into the joints afterwards and hardens to lock the field together and resist weeds. Do not substitute one for the other.

Home › Decking › Paver Patio Calculator

Paver Patio Calculator

Counts the base and the spoil, not just the pavers

A paver patio is mostly the part you never see. Under the pavers sits an inch of bedding sand and four to six inches of compacted base, so the hole is three times deeper than the paver is thick and most of the tonnage, the labour and the difference between two quotes lives down there.

Paver patio takeoff

Patio length

Patio width

Paver length

Paver width

Paver thickness

Joint width

Compacted base depth

Bedding sand depth

Waste allowance

Your paver price (optional)

$/sq ft

Your labour rate (optional)

$/sq ft

Quantities from your dimensions. Prices are yours to enter; the ranges below are somebody else's, attributed and dated.

Specification summary

Generated from on . Reopen that address to reproduce these figures exactly.

Entered

Result

What is actually under a paver patio

Worked example

A 20 ft by 14 ft patio in 8 by 4 in concrete pavers, 2 3/8 in thick, 1/8 in joints, on 1 in of sand over a 6 in compacted base.

Area. 280 sq ft.
Pavers. Each 8x4 paver with its joint covers 0.233 sq ft, so 280 sq ft needs 1,324 pavers with 10% waste.
The hole. 2.375 + 1 + 6 = 9.4 in deep, and 64% of that is base nobody ever sees.
Spoil. 8.1 cu yd of soil to get rid of, which is roughly a skip and a half.
Base. 5.2 cu yd of crushed stone, around 8 tons delivered.

The spoil line is the one that surprises people. Eight cubic yards is not a wheelbarrow job, and the cost of removing it is usually missing from the cheerful per-square-foot numbers.

The formula

Pavers divide the area. The layers are the interesting part:

n = ⌈ A (1+w) / [(l+j)(b+j)/144] ⌉ dig = t + s + base spoil = A · dig / 324

A: patio area, sq ft
l, b, j: paver length, width and joint width, in. The joint counts: it is area you do not pave
t, s, base: paver thickness, bedding sand and compacted base, in
324: the constant that turns square feet times inches into cubic yards
w: waste. 10% on a rectangle, more where the patio has curves or a border course

Including the joint in the paver footprint is the term most calculators drop. On 8x4 pavers with 1/8 in joints it is a 5% difference, which is about 60 pavers on this patio: not fatal, but it is the difference between finishing and a second trip.

The patio is the base, and the base is why quotes differ

Ask three contractors to price the same patio and you will get three very different numbers, and it is usually not the pavers. Pavers are a commodity with a published price. What varies is how deep they dig, what they put back, and how well they compact it.

On the worked example the excavation is 9.4 in deep and the base is 64% of it. That is 5.2 cubic yards of crushed stone to buy, compact in lifts, and 8.1 cubic yards of soil to remove first. A quote that skips half of it looks competitive and settles within a few seasons.

This page therefore prints the base, the sand, the spoil and the edge restraint as first-class outputs rather than an afterthought, and the figure it draws attention to is what proportion of your digging is base.

What it will not do is tell you how deep your base should be. That depends on your soil, your drainage and your frost, and it is exactly the sort of number this site refuses to publish as a single figure. The default here is a common patio depth, not a specification.

What other people are publishing for paving

This site publishes no price of its own. The ranges below were printed by Lawn Love, how much does a paver patio cost, Written by Ayoola Azzan, published 2025-12-27 and read 2026-09-07.

Lawn Love, how much does a paver patio cost, published 2025-12-27
Item	Low	High	Unit
Paver patio, installed	$8	$24	per sq ft
Materials only	$3	$30	per sq ft
Labour only	$5	$15	per sq ft
Concrete pavers	$4	$6	per sq ft, material
Brick pavers	$4	$8	per sq ft, material
Interlocking pavers	$3	$6	per sq ft, material
Natural stone	$7	$16	per sq ft, material
Flagstone	$13	$30	per sq ft, material

Bylined and dated, which is the bar this site sets, but the article does not publish a methodology. These are national ranges for installed work, not a quote, and paving is one of the trades where regional labour rates move the total most.

Frequently asked questions

How many pavers do I need for a 20x14 patio?: About 1,330 8 by 4 in pavers with a 1/8 in joint and 10% waste. The joint matters: each paver plus its joint occupies 0.232 sq ft rather than the 0.222 sq ft the paver alone measures.
How deep should the base be for a paver patio?: Commonly 4 to 6 in of compacted base for a pedestrian patio, more for poor soil, poor drainage or vehicle traffic. It is a soil and climate question rather than a universal figure, so this page treats it as an input and will not publish one number.
How much does a paver patio cost per square foot?: Lawn Love published $8 to $24 per square foot installed in December 2025, with materials $3 to $30 and labour $5 to $15. This site publishes no price of its own; those are somebody else's figures, attributed and dated, and paving is a trade where local labour rates move the total a lot.
How much soil do I need to remove for a patio?: Area times total excavation depth, divided by 324 to get cubic yards. A 280 sq ft patio dug 9.4 in deep is 8.1 cubic yards, which is a skip and a half and a real cost line.
Do I need edge restraint?: Yes, along every open edge. Without it the perimeter pavers migrate outward, the joints open and the field loses its interlock. It is the cheapest part of the job and the most commonly skipped.
What waste allowance should I use for pavers?: Ten percent on a plain rectangle. More where the patio has curves, a soldier or border course, or a herringbone pattern, all of which need cut pavers around the edge and produce offcuts that do not fit anywhere else.
Is polymeric sand different from bedding sand?: Yes, and both are needed. Bedding sand is the levelling layer under the pavers. Polymeric sand goes into the joints afterwards and hardens to lock the field together and resist weeds. Do not substitute one for the other.

Check these numbers yourself

Lawn Love, how much does a paver patio costWritten by Ayoola Azzan, published 27 December 2025. Bylined and dated national ranges. No methodology published.
ICPI, Interlocking Concrete Pavement InstituteThe trade body for segmental paving. Base, bedding and edge restraint practice.

How every figure here is verified: Sources & Method. Who builds this: About. Found something wrong? Tell us and it gets fixed or removed.

Figures on this page last checked against the source documents on 2026-09-07. Codes are amended locally; confirm against the edition your jurisdiction enforces.

Related calculators

Quantities, not a specification. Base depth, compaction and drainage depend on your soil, climate and use, and the defaults here are common patio values rather than a design. Prices are quoted from a third party with a byline and a date; this site publishes none of its own.