Where do I start tiling, and how many tiles do I buy?

1. Units and room

Cut-outs the tile does not cover (tub, island, cabinet, hearth)

2. Tile and pattern

3. Where to start

Enter the room and the tile, then click Plan the layout. Your last entries are kept on this device; the share link holds the whole setup in the part after # that no server receives.

Result

Cut list (visible size of each cut piece)

Grout and thinset

Compare starting positions

The same room and tile laid out four ways. It counts tiles and cuts only; it prices nothing except the box price you typed, so weigh it against your own quotes.

How it is calculated

Layout: the tiles are placed on a grid with your grout joint between them, on top of the floor you entered (inside the wall gap, minus the cut-outs). Every tile is clipped to the floor with exact polygon geometry, so a tile at a wall, around a cut-out or across a diagonal becomes a cut piece of its true shape. Whole tiles are counted as full.

Search: the starting position of the grid is tried at many offsets, including each wall, the middle of the room, a joint in the middle and the edges of every cut-out, and with the tile run both ways. Layouts are ranked by the number of cuts thinner than your limit first, then by the tiles to buy, then by the thinnest cut. It is repeatable: the same input gives the same plan.

Offcuts: for straight and running bond layouts a greedy cutting plan takes each cut piece from the smallest leftover that holds it, otherwise from a new tile, and keeps the pieces that remain. Diagonal offcuts are not reused, so a diagonal figure is conservative.

Not modelled: blade width, breakage, tile warp, lippage, pattern or shade matching, herringbone and other patterns, uneven walls, doorway and threshold detail, slopes and drains, trims, and underlay. Grout and thinset are estimates: the joint volume comes from the laid layout times the tile thickness you enter (joints filled to the top, wall-edge joints counted), at about 1.86 kg of cement grout per litre of joint; thinset follows the trowel notch (about 2.6, 3.8 and 5.9 kg per m² for 6, 6 × 10 and 12 mm notches) over the whole tiled floor, both plus your extra percentage. Bag coverage charts differ, so use the figure printed on your bag. The total is a planning estimate you can edit; confirm it with your installer or supplier. Unverified against a real installation: tested on hand-computed layouts and on random rooms whose pieces are checked to add up to the floor.

Common questions

How many tiles do I need for a room?

Divide the floor area by the area of one tile for a first figure, then add for cuts and breakage. The planner does the real count instead: it lays out the actual tiles on your room, counts the full tiles and the cut tiles, lets leftover pieces serve later cuts, and adds the overage you choose. The result can be a few tiles above or below the area rule depending on where the layout starts.

How much extra tile should I buy?

Installers commonly allow roughly 10 percent for a straight layout and more for diagonal or patterned layouts, and keep a few spare tiles from the same lot for future repairs. The overage is an input here, so use the figure your installer or supplier recommends. Dye lots can differ between orders, so it is safer to buy everything at once.

Why centre the layout instead of starting at a wall?

Starting at a wall leaves whatever is left over as a narrow strip at the opposite wall, which can be a sliver a few millimetres wide. Centring a tile or a joint splits the leftover between both walls so neither strip is very thin, though it makes more cut tiles. The planner compares both, and a search over many starting positions, so you can see the trade.

How much more tile does a diagonal layout need?

Diagonal layouts waste more because every tile along a wall is cut at an angle and the offcuts rarely fit anywhere else. The planner counts them exactly for your room and assumes no reuse of diagonal offcuts, so the diagonal figure is conservative. Expect a noticeably larger overage than for a straight layout.

What is running bond and how much offset should I use?

Running bond staggers each row against the one before, like brick. A half offset is common for square tiles. Many tile makers advise no more than about one third for long rectangular tiles because the ends can curl, so check the instructions for your tile. The planner lets you pick one half, one third or one quarter.

Does it account for leftover pieces being reused?

Yes, for straight and running bond layouts. A greedy cutting plan takes each cut piece from the smallest leftover that holds it, otherwise from a new tile, and splits what remains. It shows tiles to buy with and without reuse. It assumes you may turn a leftover to fit; untick that for tile with a one-way pattern. Real cutting loses a little to the blade and to breakage.

How thin can a cut tile be?

Very thin cuts are hard to make cleanly and look poor, so installers usually try to avoid them. There is no single rule; a minimum cut of around 50 mm (2 inches) is a common planning figure and is an input here. The planner counts every cut thinner than that and ranks layouts by it first.

How much grout and thinset do I need for a tile floor?

Grout fills the joints, so it depends on joint width and tile thickness far more than on floor area: narrow joints around large tile take very little. The planner works out the joint volume from your actual layout (floor tiled minus the tile faces laid) times the tile thickness, converts it at about 1.86 kg of cement grout per litre, and adds your extra percentage. Thinset follows the trowel notch: roughly 2.6 kg per m² for a 6 mm notch, 3.8 for a 6 × 10 mm and 5.9 for a 12 mm. It is an estimate; bag coverage on the product label is the better guide, and you can enter the bag size to see bags to buy.

Is my room data uploaded?

No. The planner runs in your browser from figures you type, nothing is sent to a server, there are no accounts, and it works offline after the page loads.