Use this handy quilt binding calculator to calculate how much fabric you need for binding your quilt with straight grain binding.
This free online quilting calculator is a basic version of the powerful quilting calculator available in our quilting calculator app – Quilt Geek. It’s designed to give you quick and easy fabric measurements, but for more advanced features and customization, check out our full app!
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How To Use The Quilt Binding Calculator?
Are you sewing binding on a quilt and are wondering how much yardage you need to buy? This calculator calculates the yardage required to make straight-grain binding for your quilt. It uses the exact size of your quilt, the desired overage, and the desired width of binding to calculate the exact yardage needed.
NOTE: This calculator calculates yardage for straight-grain binding. For bias binding, please use our bias binding calculator.
Begin by entering the quilt top width and quilt top length. Use the illustration as a guide. The QW (quilt top width) is the horizontal dimension of the quilt top and the QL (quilt top length) is the vertical dimension of the quilt.
Enter the width of the fabric (WOF) you are using. This is the width of the fabric, measured from one selvage edge to the other. If you don’t enter any number, the calculator will use the default, which is 42’’ (as this is the most common WOF for quilting cotton).
Enter the desired overage. This is the extra length of binding strip needed to attach the binding to the quilt.
Enter the desired binding width. This is the width of the binding strip before you iron and sew it on your project. If you don’t enter the desired width of the binding, the default will be used. This is 2 ¼’’ which is our preferred binding width.
Press CALCULATE to run the calculation.
Reading The Results Of The binding Fabric Calculator
The calculator provides the following results:
Total Binding Length is the length of binding you need for your quilt, including the overage you entered.
Number of WOF strips is the number of WOF = width of fabric strips you will need to cut from your yardage to get the required total binding length. The calculation includes the extra binding length needed to sew binding strips together.
Total Yardage is the amount of fabric (with the specified WOF = width of fabric) you need to cut for your binding. The value is rounded up to the nearest 1/8 of a yard.
How To Join Binding Strips?
After you’ve cut the required number of WOF strips for your binding, you will need to sew them together to get a continuous binding strip. Learn how to join binding strips together in our tutorial on How to make binding for a quilt.
Quilt Binding Size Chart
In case you’re looking for a quick binding reference chart for standard-size quilts, we’ve got that, as well!
The handy binding reference chart includes standard quilt sizes and tells you the total binding length, the number of WOF strips, and the yardage needed to bind the quilt.
So how do you get this chart? Easy! Just sign up for our newsletter and we’ll send you the chart as a welcome gift!
Further reading
How to bind a quilt?
For more information and step-by-step instructions, read our tutorial on how to bind a quilt.