About Board Feet Calc

Who built it

I'm Fei Hu, a frontend engineer. I built Board Feet Calc because the board foot calculators I could find work one board at a time, or tally a list of boards you already picked. None of them took the finished cut list from a plan and told me what rough lumber to buy, grouped the way a hardwood yard sells it: by species and thickness in quarters.

What it does

• Lumber list: pieces, species, quarter thickness, width, length and price per board foot, with per-species subtotals, total board feet and cost, in inches and feet or metric.
• Finished → rough: enter finished sizes; each part gets the rough quarter that surfaces to it plus width and length allowances, and the list is grouped into a buy list with waste and cost.
• Print and share: a printable tally sheet to take to the yard, and a link that holds the whole list.

How the maths works

Every formula and constant comes from a published source: a standard (NHLA, NIST), a USDA Forest Service or university extension publication, or, for the 20% waste default, woodworking trade guidance that's labelled as guidance. Each formula is tested against the source's worked example where it gives one; derived values are tested against the formula they come from. The details, with examples, are on How to calculate board feet.

Calculations are kept exact and rounded only for display. The buy quantity rounds up to whole board feet, a choice made so you don't come home short; the estimate is shown both ways.

The sources:

• National Hardwood Lumber Association, Rules for the Measurement & Inspection of Hardwood & Cypress (Effective January 1, 2023).
• National Institute of Standards and Technology, Handbook 130, Uniform Laws and Regulations: IV-B Method of Sale of Commodities (2026).
• National Institute of Standards and Technology, Voluntary Product Standard PS 20-25, American Softwood Lumber Standard (PS 20-25, January 2025).
• USDA Forest Service, Forest Products Laboratory, Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material, Chapter 6, Commercial Lumber, Round Timbers, and Ties (General Technical Report FPL-GTR-190, 2010).
• USDA Forest Service, Northeastern Research Station, Rough Mill Improvement Guide for Managers and Supervisors (GTR-NE-329) (June 2005).
• University of Wisconsin–Madison, Department of Forestry, What Is a Board Foot? (Forestry Facts, Publication No. 42, FEM-042) (August 1989).
• Penn State Extension, Valuing Standing Timber (Updated June 18, 2020).
• The Ohio State University, CFAES, Measuring Standing Trees (May 20, 2016).
• Purdue University Cooperative Extension Service, Quality Control in Lumber Purchasing: Hardwood Lumber Grades (FNR-130) (Date unconfirmed).
• National Institute of Standards and Technology, Handbook 44, Appendix C: General Tables of Units of Measurement (2026).
• Popular Woodworking, Buying Hardwood Lumber – Two Approaches (June 3, 2008), trade guidance.

Free, no sign-up, code on GitHub

The calculator is free and has no accounts. Your list stays in your browser (see Privacy). The code, formulas and tests are public on GitHub.

Spotted a wrong number or a source I should cite? Get in touch.