How Much Sod for 250 Square Feet?
Pallets to buy
1 pallet
250 square feet of new lawn, nothing deducted, 10 sq ft pieces, 2 in of topsoil, five percent waste.
When the figures look right, the sod material list downloads as a real PDF with your business details on it, built inside your own browser. Nothing you type is uploaded anywhere.
How that number is worked out
These are the figures this page was built with and every line the calculator produces from them. Change anything above and all of it moves.
- Lawn length25 ft
- Lawn width10 ft
- Beds and hardscape to deduct0 sq ft
- Piece sizeRoll, 2 by 5 ft
- Pallet coverage450 sq ft
- Topsoil to spread2 in
- Waste allowance5 %
Pallets to buy1 pallet
| Gross area | 250 sq ft |
|---|---|
| Beds and hardscape | 0 sq ft |
| Net area | 250 sq ft |
| With waste | 262.5 sq ft5 percent |
| Pieces needed | 2710 sq ft each |
| Pallets to buy | 145 pieces on a 450 sq ft pallet |
| Left over on the last pallet | 187.5 sq fta pallet does not divide |
| Sod weight | 0.72 tons1,444 lb at 5.5 lb a sq ft |
| Topsoil to spread | 1.54 cu yd2 in over the net area, order 2 because bulk soil sells by the whole yard |
| Water, one inch | 156 gal0.623 gallons a sq ft |
The material list this produces
| Sod pallets | 1 |
|---|---|
| Or sod pieces | 27 |
| Starter fertilizer, bags | 1 |
| Topsoil, cu yd | 2 |
Lawn area compared
Every small lawn size on this list, at the same piece and pallet coverage. Watch the last column rather than the first: the pallet count steps, and the square feet you pay for and do not use swings from almost nothing to most of a pallet between one size and the next.
| Lawn area | Pallets to buy | Pieces needed | Left over on the last pallet |
|---|---|---|---|
| 50 sq ft | 1 pallet | 6 | 397.5 sq ft |
| 100 sq ft | 1 pallet | 11 | 345 sq ft |
| 200 sq ft | 1 pallet | 21 | 240 sq ft |
| 250 sq ft | 1 pallet | 27 | 187.5 sq ft |
| 300 sq ft | 1 pallet | 32 | 135 sq ft |
| 400 sq ft | 1 pallet | 42 | 30 sq ft |
| 500 sq ft | 2 pallets | 53 | 375 sq ft |
| 600 sq ft | 2 pallets | 63 | 270 sq ft |
| 700 sq ft | 2 pallets | 74 | 165 sq ft |
| 800 sq ft | 2 pallets | 84 | 60 sq ft |
| 1,000 sq ft | 3 pallets | 105 | 300 sq ft |
What else matters here
Twenty seven pieces of sod and 1.54 cu yd of topsoil, and it is the topsoil that decides whether the lawn is still there in two years.
Sod arrives with about an inch of soil on the back of it and roots that have been cut off short. Those roots have to get down into something within two weeks or the sod sits there as a mat, going brown in patches and lifting at the corners. Two inches of decent topsoil, raked level and lightly firmed, is what they grow into. Laying sod straight onto compacted subsoil or onto builder's fill is the single most common reason a new lawn fails.
Two inches is also the depth at which it is worth ordering rather than bagging. Bulk topsoil is sold by the yard and delivered loose, and a yard and a half is a small heap that one person moves in an afternoon with a wheelbarrow. In bags it is a lot of bags.
What this calculator assumes
- Sod is bought by the pallet and a pallet does not divide, so the order is rounded up to a whole pallet and the leftover is printed rather than hidden. Pallet coverage is a yard by yard number, from 400 to 600 square feet, which is why it is a field here instead of a constant.
- Waste sits at five percent rather than the ten a sheet material gets. Sod cuts around a curve with a knife and the offcut usually goes somewhere, so the loss is real but smaller.
- Weight is figured at 5.5 pounds a square foot, which is a pallet around two and a half thousand pounds. Freshly cut or wet sod runs heavier, and that is the number that matters when you decide whether it goes in a pickup or on a delivery truck.
- Topsoil is the amount to spread and grade before the sod goes down, not the amount already there. Two inches is the common starting point on a bare or stripped yard and none at all is right on ground that is already good.
- A pallet line and a piece line are both printed because yards sell sod both ways, by the pallet on a big lawn and by the piece on a patch. Only one of those two lines gets bought.
- Starter fertilizer is figured at a bag per five thousand square feet, which is where most starter products land. Read your bag rather than this line, because the spread rate is printed on it.
- The water line is one inch over the whole lawn, which is 0.623 gallons a square foot. New sod wants roughly that much every day for the first week, which is the part of a sod job people underestimate.
Questions people ask
How many pieces of sod for 250 square feet?
27 pieces at 10 square feet each, including five percent waste.
How much topsoil do I need under sod?
About 2 inches over the area, which for 250 square feet is 1.54 cubic yards. The cut roots have to reach something they can grow into within a fortnight.
Can I lay sod directly on existing soil?
Only if it is loose, level and reasonably good. Sod laid on compacted subsoil or builder's fill sits as a mat, browns in patches and lifts at the corners, and that is the usual reason a new lawn fails.
The sod calculator takes any dimensions you like and hands back the same list.