Carpentry Calculators

Drawer box sizes

Measure the opening, pick the slides, and get the box: width, height, depth to the nearest stocked slide, the bottom panel, the front, and a cut list for as many drawers as you are building.

The opening

in

Inside the face frame

in
in

= 23.25"

in

= 0.75"

in

= 0.5"

The slides

in

What the spec sheet says

The common slide. 1/2" each side, so the box is the opening less 1".

in

Both together

The box

in

= 0.5"

in

= 0.25"

in

= 0.25"

in

= 0.5"

The front

Front style
in

= 0.5"

in

= 0.75"

Drawer box for a 24" opening

Box width

23"

Box height

6"

Box depth

22"

Slides

22"

Clear inside

22"

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23" × 6" box1/2" of slide each side · overlay front 25" × 8"

Cut list for 4 drawers

Sides × 81/2" thick — Full depth of the box, grooved for the bottom
22" × 6"
Front and back (between the sides) × 81/2" thick — Box width less two sides, plus 1/4" at each end for the groove
22 1/2" × 6"
Bottom × 41/4" thick — A hair under the groove-to-groove size, so it is not a press fit
21 7/16" × 22 7/16"
Drawer front (overlay) × 43/4" thick — Laps the opening by 1/2" all round
25" × 8"

Lengths first, then widths, then thickness.

Send these to the cut list optimizer

They arrive grouped by thickness — the 1/2″ sides and the 1/4″ bottoms are two different sheets — and the optimizer asks which pile you are cutting before it adds anything.

Before you cut

  • A stocked slide length fits the cabinet — passes22" slides, in 22.00" of room. Slides come in two-inch steps, so the box is built to the slide rather than to the cabinet.
  • Sides at least 2" tall — passes6.000" of side to screw a slide to.
  • Groove no deeper than half the side — passes1/4" groove in 1/2" stock.
  • Groove clear of the bottom edge — passesBottom of the groove 1/2" up from the bottom edge, so the bottom sits that far above the slide.
  • Something left inside — passes22.00" of clear width inside the box.

Measure the opening, not the drawing

Face frames are not square and cabinets are not identical. Measure every opening in the run, at the top and at the bottom, and build each box to its own hole — a bank of four boxes all cut to the same number will have one that binds.

Then check the box is square before the glue sets. A drawer box out of square by a sixteenth runs on the slides at an angle and wears the ball races out on one side.

About building drawers

How much clearance does a drawer slide need?
A standard side-mount ball-bearing slide takes exactly 1/2" on each side, so the box is the opening less 1". That figure is on every spec sheet and it is not a tolerance to shave — the slide is a fixed thickness. Undermount slides want far less side clearance, around 5/16" in total, but they also dictate the box depth and the bottom thickness, so build those to the maker's sheet rather than to a rule of thumb.
How deep should the drawer box be?
As deep as the slide, and slides come in 2" steps: 10, 12, 14 and so on. Work out what is left after the face frame at the front and whatever has to live behind the box, then take the next slide down. A 24" deep base cabinet with a 3/4" face frame usually lands on 22" slides.
What size should the drawer front be?
For an overlay front, the opening plus twice the overlay: a 24" by 7" opening with a 1/2" overlay takes a 25" by 8" front. For an inset front, the opening less twice the reveal, and the reveal should not be under 1/16" — a solid wood front moves across its width with the seasons and an inset front with no gap binds the first humid week.
How thick should drawer sides be?
1/2" for ordinary kitchen and furniture drawers, 5/8" or 3/4" for wide drawers or anything that will carry real weight. Thinner sides make a bigger box inside the same opening, which is the argument for them; they also give you less to screw a slide to and less to cut a joint into.
Where does the groove for the bottom go?
Usually 1/2" up from the bottom edge of the sides, cut 1/4" deep for a 1/4" bottom. Keeping it that far up leaves room for the slide screws and keeps the groove out of the bottom edge, which is the part that takes the knocks. The bottom panel itself is cut a thirty-second under the groove-to-groove size so it can be dropped in rather than forced.

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