Tarmac Cost Calculator

How this calculator works

Every figure in this calculator is the one published in the cost table on our tarmac guide. Pick the option that matches your job and the calculator returns that published range, adjusted for your region - it does not model anything the guide does not already say.

That is deliberate. A calculator whose rates drift from the page it sits under is worse than no calculator, because two numbers on the same site disagree.

What it cannot know: access, the condition of what is already there, and anything structural. Those are what separate three real quotes from each other.

What actually moves a tarmac driveway quote

The calculator hands you a fair budget from the published rates above, but three surfacing gangs pricing the same drive can still come back a good way apart. Most of the gap is in the ground and the getting-there, neither of which a dropdown can see.

What’s already down. A resurface over sound old tarmac is a different job from a full dig-out. If the base has moved or holds water, a fresh wearing course laid straight over it will telegraph every fault within a season. Ask each quote to say plainly whether it’s an overlay or a dig-out to a new Type 1 sub-base – you can’t compare two prices that assume different work.

Edging and restraint. Tarmac needs something to hold its edge or it crumbles away where a wheel clips it. A drive with existing kerbs or a solid boundary is cheaper than one that needs new block-paving edging or a concrete haunch run right round. That perimeter work is easy to leave off a keen quote and notice later.

Access and the hot lorry. Tarmac goes down hot and has to be rolled before it cools, so the distance from the wagon to the drive matters. A tipper that can back straight on works faster than one barrowing hot material through a side gate. Tight lanes, parked cars and a plant a long haul away all push the labour up.

Drainage and the front-garden rules. Tarmac sheds water rather than soaking it away, so in England you generally need planning permission to lay more than five square metres of it in a front garden unless the run-off goes to a permeable border or a soakaway rather than the road. The government’s guidance on paving over front gardens sets out when consent is needed – worth checking before anyone quotes for channels or a soakaway.

Last thing to line up: muck-away. A dig-out generates spoil that has to be carted off and tipped, and tip charges vary. Make sure every quote either includes disposal or says it doesn’t, so you’re not comparing one that carts the old surface away against one that leaves it on the verge.