Mortar Calculator

Mortar Calculator works out, in seconds, how much mortar you need to lay your bricks or blocks, and how that mortar splits into bags of cement and cubic metres of sand. Enter the brick count (or the wall area), choose a mix ratio, and read the materials to order straight away. It works completely offline and nothing you enter ever leaves your phone.

HOW IT WORKS
The app uses the standard bricklaying method:

1. Each brick swallows a small, fairly constant volume of wet mortar for its bed and perpend joints — about 0.7 litres (0.0007 m3) for a standard brick in a single-leaf wall. Multiply by the number of bricks for the wet mortar volume.

2. A wastage allowance you choose (typically 5 to 10 percent) is added for spillage and the mortar left on the board.

3. Loose dry cement and sand are full of air gaps that close up when mixed and compacted, so the dry materials must add up to about one third more than the wet mortar. The app multiplies by a dry factor of 1.33.

4. Your cement-to-sand mix ratio then splits the dry volume. A 1:4 mix is one part cement to four parts sand by volume, so cement is one fifth of the dry volume and sand four fifths.

5. Cement bags come from cement's density (1440 kg/m3, 50 kg per bag, rounded up to whole bags); sand weight from its own density (about 1600 kg/m3).

WORKED EXAMPLE
1,000 bricks at 0.7 litres each, plus 10 percent wastage, mixed 1:4, give about 0.77 m3 of wet mortar. That needs roughly 6 bags of cement (about 295 kg) and 0.82 m3 of sand (about 1.31 tonnes).

WHAT YOU CAN DO
- Enter a brick or block count, or a wall area with bricks per square metre
- Set the wet mortar allowed per brick, or keep the sensible default
- Pick a cement-to-sand mix ratio from 1:2 to 1:6
- Choose a wastage allowance from 0 to 30 percent with a slider
- Read the wet mortar volume, cement bags and weight, and sand volume and weight at a glance
- Open Details for a full step-by-step breakdown and a side-by-side table of common mixes
- Learn the simple maths behind the numbers in plain language

BUILT FOR CLARITY
The "Bond" design language pairs a cool wet-mortar grey with a warm clay accent and a straw-sand tone on a pale limewash background, putting the big number first with the supporting figures right beside it. Light and dark themes, a tiny download, no clutter and no account required.

AN ESTIMATE, NOT A QUANTITY SURVEY
This is a simplified educational tool. Real mortar consumption varies with joint thickness, brick suction, the sand grading and moisture, the mix design and your bricklayer's practice, and the dry factor and densities used are typical rather than exact. Order a sensible margin and always confirm the final quantities with your supplier or builder before buying. This app is for general information and education only and is not professional construction advice.

PRIVACY
The app collects no personal data and works fully offline. Ads are served by Google AdMob, which may use an advertising identifier as described in Google's policies.

Download Mortar Calculator and get a quick, sensible picture of the mortar, cement and sand your next job will take.