Red oak board foot calculator
Enter the finished size of your parts and this works back to the rough red oak you need to buy. Price and weight are already filled in — change the price to whatever your yard charges.
- Ballpark price
- $7.00/bf
- Weight
- 44 lb/ft³
- Janka hardness
- 1290 lbf
= 0.75"
Straight off the mill. You pay for the saw marks, the cup and the wane, and you mill it all away.
Ballpark — use your yard's price
Buy this much
7.80board feet
Estimated cost
$54.60
Approx. weight
29 lb
Finished volume
4.50 bf
Your parts contain 4.50 bf of wood. Milling 3/4" parts needs 1" rough stock, which takes that to 6.00 bf, and the Rough allowance of 30% for cutoffs and defect brings it to 7.80 bf.
Ask for
1 4/4 red oak, 12 ft long and about 8″ wide
8.00 bf — 3% over what you need, and each board yields 4 of your pieces. Hardwood is sold random-width, so expect the yard to hand you something close rather than exact.
Working red oak
The default hardwood in North America: cheap, everywhere, and stable once dry. Open pores mean you can blow through a can of grain filler getting a glass-smooth finish, and the pink cast fights some stains. Not for exterior work — the pores wick water straight along the grain.
44 lb/ft³ · Janka 1290 lbf · prices reviewed 2026-09-01
Buying red oak
The default hardwood in North America: cheap, everywhere, and stable once dry. Open pores mean you can blow through a can of grain filler getting a glass-smooth finish, and the pink cast fights some stains. Not for exterior work — the pores wick water straight along the grain.
The price above is a national ballpark for reasonable-grade 4/4 stock, last reviewed 2026-09-01. Hardwood prices move with region, grade, width and supplier — treat this as a starting point and ring your yard before you commit to a budget.
Red oak questions
- How much does red oak cost per board foot?
- Roughly $7.00 per board foot for 4/4 stock, as a national ballpark last reviewed 2026-09-01. Regional supply, grade, width and whether you are buying from a hardwood dealer or a big-box store move this a long way — the calculator lets you type in your own price.
- How much does red oak weigh?
- About 44 lb per cubic foot at furniture moisture content, which works out to roughly 3.7 lb per board foot. The calculator estimates the weight of your order so you know whether it fits in the car.
- How hard is red oak?
- 1290 lbf on the Janka scale. For reference, red oak is 1290 and is the usual benchmark for a hardwood floor; anything much under 1000 will show dents in a tabletop that gets used.
- How much does red oak move with the seasons?
- A 12" wide plain sawn board moves about 0.31" across its width over a typical seasonal swing, and roughly 43% of that if it is quartersawn. Design any solid panel wider than about six inches to float rather than be fastened at both edges.
- What should I know about working red oak?
- The default hardwood in North America: cheap, everywhere, and stable once dry. Open pores mean you can blow through a can of grain filler getting a glass-smooth finish, and the pink cast fights some stains. Not for exterior work — the pores wick water straight along the grain.