Raised Bed Builder Calculator

Both — each Material option is standardized to one representative board size: Pine/Spruce uses 2x6 (5.5" actual height), Cedar uses 2x8 (7.25"), Composite uses 2x10 (9.25"), and Pressure-Treated uses 2x12 (11.25"). That board height drives Board Courses, so switching Material changes the course count, Lumber Needed, and Total Boards, not just the per-linear-foot price in Lumber Cost. If you're building with a different board size than the one standardized here, adjust the course count manually using your actual board height.

Lumber only comes in fixed dimensional sizes, so Board Courses rounds up to the nearest whole board for your selected Material's board height — a 12-inch target needs 2 courses of 7.25-inch Cedar boards (14.5 inches total) but 3 courses of 5.5-inch Pine/Spruce boards (16.5 inches total), both slightly exceeding the requested depth, rather than a fractional course that doesn't exist as a real product. This is standard practice in raised bed construction: you build to the nearest whole-board depth for your chosen lumber size, not the exact number entered.

Yes, typically by a wide margin — Soil Cost here assumes roughly $45 per cubic yard delivered in bulk, while bagged garden soil commonly costs several times that per cubic foot once you account for the number of bags needed to fill even a modest bed. Bulk delivery usually has a minimum order or delivery fee, though, so it may not pencil out for a single small bed.

No — Estimated Total Cost covers lumber, corner posts, hardware, and bulk soil pricing only. It does not include delivery fees for bulk soil or lumber, site leveling or weed-barrier fabric underneath the bed, or the soil top-off that most raised beds need after the first season as organic material settles and decomposes.