Free brick calculator
Tell us your wall's length and height, pick a brick size, and this calculator turns the area into a brick count using the Brick Industry Association's wall-area method — then adds the mortar bags and a waste margin so your order matches the wall. Switch between single- and double-brick walls and subtract doors and windows, with every figure updated live, as you type.
On this page15 sections
| Material | Quantity | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|
| Bricks | 1,188 | $832 |
| Mortar mix (80 lb) | 12 bags | $102 |
| Total materials | $934 |
Prices are regional estimates: face brick ≈ $0.70 each, mortar mix ≈ $8.50 per 80 lb bag. Rates from BIA Technical Note 10 (3/8 in. joint). Excludes ties, flashing and labor.
Brick rates and prices vary by size, bond and supplier. How accurate is this?
Results are estimates. Consult a professional.
How the brick calculator works
Brick is bought by the piece, but a wall is measured by its area, so the whole job is converting square feet of wall into a brick count. The calculator multiplies your wall's length by its height to get the net area, subtracts any door and window openings, then multiplies by a published "bricks per square foot" rate for your brick size and mortar joint. It does the same for mortar, working out how many cubic feet — and how many bags of mortar mix — the joints between those bricks will swallow.
What the result means
Two numbers carry the order. The brick count — with waste already added — is how many bricks to have delivered to the site. The mortar figure, shown both in cubic feet and in 80 lb bags, is how much jointing material to buy alongside them. Because brick and mortar are bought from different aisles, the calculator keeps them separate so you can order each correctly.
What goes into your brick estimate
A brick estimate is built from four pieces: the net wall area, the brick size, the wall thickness in wythes, and the waste margin. Get each right and the pallet that shows up matches the wall you are building.
Net wall area — the base number
Length times height, minus the openings. A door or a picture window is wall area you do not brick, so subtracting it keeps you from over-ordering. This is the part the calculator nails exactly — the geometry is simple, and openings are just rectangles you take back out.
Brick size — how many cover a square foot
Brick face area sets the rate. A standard modular brick (7⅝ in. long, 2¼ in. high) plus a 3/8 in. joint works out to about 6.75 bricks per square foot. A long, low Norman brick covers more wall each, so it needs only about 4.5 per square foot; a taller Utility brick needs about 3. Pick the wrong size and the count can be off by a third.
Wythes — single brick vs. double brick
A wythe is one vertical layer of brick. A modern brick veneer is a single wythe — one brick thick. An older solid masonry or garden wall is often two wythes, a full brick thick, which doubles both the brick count and the mortar. The calculator multiplies the whole estimate by the number of wythes you set.
A worked example using the brick calculator
Priya is building a 20 ft long × 8 ft high garden wall as a single-brick veneer (1 wythe) in standard modular brick with 3/8 in. joints. There are no openings. She wants the brick count with a 10% waste margin, and how many bags of mortar to buy.
Step 1 — Find the net wall area
20 ft × 8 ft = 160 ft². No doors or windows, so the net area is the full 160 ft².
Step 2 — Multiply by the per-square-foot rate
Modular brick covers 6.75 per ft², so 160 × 6.75 = 1,080 bricks bare, for a single wythe.
Step 3 — Add the waste margin
With 10% added for breakage and cuts, 1,080 × 1.10 = 1,188 bricks to order.
Step 4 — Work out the mortar
Modular brick uses about 5.5 ft³ of mortar per 100 ft² of wall, so 160 ft² needs 8.8 ft³. Adding 20% mortar waste gives 10.56 ft³; divided by the 0.88 ft³ an 80 lb bag yields and rounded up, that is 12 bags.
How many bricks per square foot?
The rate depends entirely on brick size and joint. This table lists the common US brick sizes with their per-square-foot brick count and mortar quantity at the standard 3/8 in. joint, for a single wythe. Multiply by your wall area, then by the number of wythes.
| Brick size | Nominal face (H × L) | Bricks per ft² | Mortar (ft³ / 100 ft²) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Modular | 2⅔ in. × 8 in. | 6.75 | 5.5 |
| Standard | 2¼ in. × 8 in. | 6.55 | 9.5 |
| Engineer modular | 3⅕ in. × 8 in. | 5.63 | 4.8 |
| Queen | 2¾ in. × 8 in. | 5.50 | 6.7 |
| Norman | 2⅔ in. × 12 in. | 4.50 | 5.1 |
| Utility | 4 in. × 12 in. | 3.00 | 3.7 |
From BIA Technical Note 10, Table 4 (3/8 in. joint), per 100 ft² ÷ 100. Mortar is for a single wythe; double it for a two-wythe wall and add 15–25% for waste.
When to use this brick calculator
Use it any time the order turns on how many bricks a wall takes — which is every brick job, because brick is delivered by the pallet and a short order means a second delivery fee while an over-order means leftover pallets to store.
- Brick veneer — the single-wythe brick facing on a house or extension, the most common modern use.
- Garden and boundary walls — often double-brick (two wythes) for stability, free-standing in the yard.
- Pillars and piers — gate posts and porch piers, where you brick all four faces.
- Repairs and infill — filling an old doorway or patching a wall, where you size the order to a small, known area.
Building in block instead of brick, or pouring footings under the wall? Switch to the concrete block calculator for CMU walls, or the concrete calculator to size the footing the brickwork sits on.
Single brick vs. double brick (wythes)
"Wythe" is the mason's word for one vertical layer of brick. How many wythes your wall has decides the strength, the thickness — and the brick count, because every wythe is a full wall's worth of brick on its own.
| Wall type | Wythes | Typical use |
|---|---|---|
| Single brick (veneer) | 1 | House facing over a backing wall; the standard modern veneer |
| Double brick (solid) | 2 | Free-standing garden walls; older solid load-bearing walls |
| Cavity wall | 2 | Two single-brick skins with a gap; count each skin as a wythe |
A two-wythe wall uses roughly twice the brick and mortar of a single-wythe wall of the same face area. Set the wythe count in the calculator to match.
One caution: a free-standing double-brick wall is a structural element. For anything above a low garden wall, follow the height-to-thickness limits and footing details your local building code or a structural engineer specifies, rather than building tall off a single course count.
Waste factor: how many extra bricks to order
Order the bare calculated count and you will run short. Bricks crack in handling, corners and openings force cuts that waste the offcut, and a few in every pallet arrive chipped or off-color and get set aside. A modest overage covers all of it.
The 5–10% rule
The Brick Industry Association recommends adding at least 5% for breakage and waste, and more when the job has many cuts. For a plain rectangular wall, 5% is enough; for walls with lots of corners, angles, or openings to cut around, 10% is the safer figure and some masons go higher. The calculator defaults brick waste to 10% and lets you adjust it.
Mortar waste runs higher
Mortar waste is larger than brick waste — material drops off the trowel, stiffens in the board before it is used, and clings to the mixer. BIA suggests adding 15–25% to the net mortar quantity. The calculator uses 20% for mortar by default, which is why the bag count is a little generous on purpose.
Brick definitions
Brick calculator questions
How many bricks are in a square foot?
For a standard modular brick with a 3/8 in. mortar joint, about 6.75 bricks per square foot of wall face — commonly rounded to 7. Bigger bricks need fewer: a Norman brick is about 4.5 per square foot, a Utility brick about 3. The figure is for a single wythe; a double-brick wall uses twice as many.
How much mortar do I need for 1,000 bricks?
For modular brick at a 3/8 in. joint, BIA Table 4 lists about 8.1 ft³ of mortar per 1,000 bricks before waste. With a typical 80 lb mortar-mix bag yielding roughly 0.88 ft³, that is about 9–10 bags per 1,000 bricks net, or 11–12 once you add mortar waste.
Do I subtract windows and doors?
Yes. Total the area of every opening and enter it so the calculator removes it from the wall area. On a wall with large windows the openings can be a fifth of the face, so skipping them leads to a sizeable over-order.
How many bricks per square meter?
For a standard UK-format brick (215 mm long × 65 mm high) with a 10 mm joint — the metric equivalent of the US modular brick and its 3/8 in. joint — a single-skin wall takes about 60 bricks per square meter. That is the figure most UK and Australian merchants quote. Double it to roughly 120 per square meter for a one-brick-thick (two-leaf) wall.
Sources and references
The estimating rates are the published "wall-area method" figures from the Brick Industry Association; the mortar-bag yield is from manufacturer product data.
- Brick Industry Association — Technical Note 10, "Dimensioning and Estimating Brick Masonry" (Feb 2009), Tables 3 and 4. Source for the per-square-foot brick counts (modular 675 / 100 ft² = 6.75), mortar quantities (5.5 ft³ / 100 ft²), and the 5% brick / 15–25% mortar waste guidance.
- QUIKRETE Mortar Mix (No. 1102) — ASTM C270 Type N mortar; an 80 lb bag yields approximately 0.88 ft³, the bag-count basis used here.
- Brick Industry Association (gobrick.com) — standard US brick sizes and nominal dimensions (modular, standard, Norman, queen, engineer, utility).
Frequently asked questions about the free brick calculator
About this brick calculator
This brick calculator runs entirely in your browser — nothing you type is sent anywhere or stored. It uses the Brick Industry Association's published per-square-foot rates (TN 10, Table 4, for the standard 3/8 in. mortar joint) to turn your wall dimensions into a brick count, a mortar quantity, and an 80 lb-bag estimate, with brick and mortar waste factored in.
It's part of our construction calculators collection — sitting alongside the concrete and concrete block estimators for the rest of your masonry. Browse every tool on the site from the full calculator directory.