Square feet in, gallons out — rounded up to cans you can actually buy, because the store doesn't sell 3.4 gallons.
| Area to paint | 1 coat (exact → cans) | 2 coats (exact → cans) |
|---|---|---|
| 250 sqft | 0.7 → buy 1 | 1.4 → buy 2 |
| 400 sqft | 1.1 → buy 2 | 2.3 → buy 3 |
| 800 sqft | 2.3 → buy 3 | 4.6 → buy 5 |
| 1,200 sqft | 3.4 → buy 4 | 6.9 → buy 7 |
| 2,000 sqft | 5.7 → buy 6 | 11.4 → buy 12 |
| 3,000 sqft | 8.6 → buy 9 | 17.1 → buy 18 |
350 sqft per gallon is the working number for smooth interior walls and the one this table uses. Fresh drywall, stucco and rough-sawn wood all drink more; some primers stretch further. When the label and reality disagree, believe your last job.
Buy the second coat's paint up front. Color-matched batches vary, and a mid-wall can change from a different batch is visible in low afternoon light — painters call it flashing.
A fence painted both sides is double the area: 100 ft of 6 ft fence is 600 sqft a side, 1,200 sqft total, and rough-sawn boards can push coverage under 300 sqft/gallon. One side only? Halve it. Pickets with gaps are their own argument — measure the boards, not the air.
Gallons are the easy 20% of an estimate. Labor is the rest, and it's where underbidding actually happens. Our free interior estimate calculator turns the same square footage into crew hours and a bid price with overhead and margin built in.
This page prices walls with fixed assumptions. The full PaintProfit calculator prices walls, ceilings, trim and doors at separate production rates, builds a quote sheet you can send, tracks estimated vs actual per job, and runs five sanity checks before a bid goes out. $49 once, 14-day refund.
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