Concrete Cost Calculator
A 400 square foot slab 4 inches thick is 4.9383 cubic yards, 5.4321 with this sheet’s 10 % waste and 5.5 cubic yards once rounded up to the quarter yard the plant bills in. Your price goes on that ordered figure.
Units available: US customary / metric.
What you are pouring, and what it is quoted at
Order 5.5 cu yd
- Net volume
- 4.94 cu yd (133.33 cu ft)
- Slab area
- 400 sq ft
- Bags needed
- 326 × 60 lb
- Check326 bags is a day of mixing. Price a ready-mix delivery instead.
Drawings
G-201Takeoff
| Item | Net qty | Waste | Order |
|---|---|---|---|
| Concrete ordered400 sq ft × 4 in ÷ 12 = 133.33 cu ft, ÷ 27, +10 %, rounded up to the next 0.25 cu yd. | 4.94 cu yd | 10% | 5.5 cu yd |
| Bagged concrete mix, 60 lb0.45 cu ft of mixed concrete per bag (QUIKRETE No. 1101 data sheet). | 146.67 cu ft | 10% | 326 bags |
Assumptions used
- 1 cubic yard = 27 cubic feet; 1 cubic yard = 0.764554857984 cubic metres.
- Waste allowance 10% applied to the in-place volume. This is the tool's own editable assumption, not an industry figure.
- The order is rounded up to the next 0.25 cu yd step; confirm your plant's increment.
- Bag yield 0.45 cu ft per 60 lb bag of standard concrete mix (QUIKRETE No. 1101 data sheet).
- Every price, the minimum load, the short-load fee and the delivery charge are figures you typed. This page publishes no average price: a ready-mix price is set per plant, per region and per day.
- Material only: no labour, no pump, no finishing, no equipment.
What the plant bills, against what you pour
No price is printed anywhere on this sheet, because there is no honest one to print. Two roundings sit between the slab and the invoice, and both cost money. The first is the waste allowance: 4.9383 cubic yards of slab becomes 5.4321 at the 10 % this sheet starts with. That 10 % is the tool’s own editable assumption, not an industry allowance and not a figure anyone publishes — set it to 0 and the same slab orders 5 cubic yards; set it to 25 and it orders 6.25.
The second is the 0.25 cubic yard step this sheet rounds a ready-mix order to (confirm the increment your plant batches in), and it only ever rounds up: 5.4321 is billed as 5.5. A 9 by 10 foot pad 9 inches thick with waste off lands on 2.5 exactly; make it 9.01 inches and the order becomes 2.75. Every cost line on this sheet is built on the ordered figure, which is the one the ticket carries.
Assumption. The price is per cubic yard in both systems. One cubic metre is 1.308 cubic yards. Switching to metric converts the slab, not the price you typed, so the total does not move.
Four questions that get a firm price in one call
- What is the delivered price per cubic yard for this mix, today?
- What is the minimum load, in cubic yards?
- What is the short-load fee below it, and is it flat or per yard?
- How long may the truck stay before waiting time starts?
Enter the minimum and the fee together and the sheet adds the fee only when your order is genuinely below the minimum; enter one without the other and it says so instead of guessing. Delivery is added only if you type it. Nothing is inferred, and no threshold is invented.
Bags against a truck, at your own prices
The bag count is arithmetic on the QUIKRETE yield: 146.67 cubic feet
divided by 0.45 cubic feet a bag is 326 bags of 60 lb for the
default slab, or 245 of 80 lb. Past 60 bags the sheet raises the count against
the truck — 326 bags is a day of mixing. Price a ready-mix delivery
instead.
The 144 sq ft pad is the real decision:
118 bags against 2 cubic yards delivered.
Price both and the sheet names the cheaper route and the gap in dollars — at the prices you typed, on the day you typed them. It does not recommend either. Bagged concrete and ready-mix are not the same purchase: one is your labour, one is a truck with a schedule. Below one cubic yard ordered, the sheet says plainly that bags are often the cheaper way to place it and tells you to ask whether a minimum load applies — it names no threshold, because it has no published one to name.
Reading the takeoff
Footings and columns get the same treatment and lose the square-foot line, because neither has a meaningful area: a 40 ft footing 16 inches wide and 8 inches deep is 35.5556 cubic feet, ordered as 1.5 cubic yards; four 12 inch columns 9 feet high are 28.2743 cubic feet, 1.0472 cubic yards, ordered as 1.25. Every line exports to CSV with the arithmetic that produced it. For the quantity on its own, with thickened edges, multiple sections and weight, use the concrete calculator — S-101 answers how much concrete, G-201 answers what the load costs.
Slab V = L x W x t / 12 (ft, ft, in -> cu ft) Footing V = L x w / 12 x d / 12 Column V = pi x (D/12/2)^2 x h x n Waste Vw = V x (1 + waste / 100) Yards Y = Vw / 27 Order Yo = ceil( Y / 0.25 ) x 0.25 Bags B = ceil( Vw / bag yield ) Truck $ = Yo x price + fee + delivery Bags $ = B x price per bag
- t, d
- Thickness or depth in inches; the section drawing carries it.
- bag yield
- Cubic feet of mixed concrete per bag: 0.45 for a 60 lb bag.
- fee
- Your short-load fee, applied only below the minimum load you typed.
Frequently asked
- How many yards of concrete do I need for a 20x20 slab?
- At 4 inches, 400 sq ft × 4 ÷ 12 = 133.33 cubic feet, 4.9383 cubic yards. Add the sheet’s 10 % waste and it is 5.4321, ordered as 5.5 cubic yards. In bags: 326 at 60 lb.
- How many yards of concrete for a 30x40 slab?
- 400 cubic feet at 4 inches, 14.8148 cubic yards net, 16.2963 with 10 % waste, ordered as 16.5 cubic yards — 978 bags of 60 lb if you mixed it yourself.
- How much concrete do I need for a 40x60 slab?
- 800 cubic feet, 29.6296 cubic yards net, 32.75 cubic yards ordered at 10 % waste. That is several trucks: ask the plant how many yards its drums carry before you set the pour times.
- How much concrete for a 12x12 slab at 4 inches?
- 48 cubic feet, 1.7778 cubic yards, 2 cubic yards ordered — or 118 bags of 60 lb. Ask your producer what its minimum load is and what it charges below it, then compare the two.
- How many yards of concrete do I need for a 24x24 x4 slab?
- 192 cubic feet, 7.1111 cubic yards net, 7.8222 with waste, 8 cubic yards ordered. Drop the waste to zero and it is 7.25.
- How much is 1 yard of concrete right now?
- No page can know today’s price at your plant: ready-mix is quoted per plant, per region and per day, and no agency publishes it. The four questions above get the real figure in one call; type it in and this sheet applies it to the 0.25-yard order quantity.
Limits of this sheet
G-201 prices the concrete and nothing else: no labour, no forms, no reinforcement, no pump, no finishing, no base course. It holds no price of its own — not an average, not a range, not an example — because a ready-mix price is set per plant and per day. What it guarantees is that the quantity your price is multiplied by is the quantity the plant bills. Pouring footings? Take the quantity off S-103 footing first, then price it here.
Sheet G-201 prepared by TakeoffMetric Editorial; no author, credential or field measurement is claimed.
Sources checked
The documents the numbers on this sheet were checked against. Nothing here is attributed to an author or a credential we do not have.
- QUIKRETE QUIKRETE Concrete Mix No. 1101 data sheet (PDF) Every bag yield on this sheet: 40 lb 0.30, 50 lb 0.375, 60 lb 0.45, 80 lb 0.60, 90 lb 0.675 cu ft. Opened 2026-09-19.