How to Calculate Cement Yardage

Building your own cement patio or walkway for your house is less expensive than hiring a contractor. But before make that trip to Home Depot, save some time and money by figuring out how many cubic yards of cement you need. Each bag of cement states how many cubic yards it covers, so if you know the total number of cubic yards needed for the project, you can figure out how many bags of cement to buy. But first you need to know the volume of the space to be filled (see Reference 1).

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Instructions

- 1
  Measure, in inches, the length, width and height of the space to be filled with cement. For example, let's say you are making a cement walkway that is 286 inches long, 172 inches wide and 5 inches high.
- 2
  Multiply the length times the width times the height to obtain the volume of cement required in cubic inches. (see Reference 1). So for your hypothetical walkway, you multiply 286 inches times 172 inches times 5 inches, which equals a volume of 245,960 cubic inches.
- 3
  Convert the volume to cubic yards by dividing it by 46,656 because one cubic yard equals 46,656 cubic inches. (see Reference 2). When you divide 245,960 cubic inches by 46,656 cubic inches per cubic yard, you get a volume of 5.3 cubic yards. Now you know how much cement to buy at the store.

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