Board and Batten Layout Calculator

Enter a wall's width and a target batten spacing to get the exact number of battens and the evenly divided gap between them.

How to Use the Board and Batten Layout Calculator

Enter the wall's width and height, a batten width, and the spacing you'd like between battens. The calculator won't use that spacing exactly — it nudges the batten count up or down until the gap divides the wall evenly, then shows you the real number.

Nobody's wall width is a clean multiple of "batten width plus 12 inches," so a layout planned around a fixed spacing always ends up with a leftover sliver at one end. The fix is to solve for the batten count first, then let the gap come out however it needs to:

battens ≈ (wall width + target gap) ÷ (batten width + target gap)
actual gap = (wall width − battens × batten width) ÷ (battens − 1)

Round the battens estimate to a whole number, plug it back in, and the gap that comes out is what you actually cut to — not the number you typed in. It'll usually be within a half inch of your target, which nobody will notice once the wall's painted.

Reading the On-Center Number

On-center spacing (batten width plus gap) is what most tape measures and layout marks use, since you're measuring from the same edge of each batten rather than the gap alone. It's the number worth writing on the wall in pencil before cutting anything.

Total batten linear footage just multiplies the batten count by wall height — useful for a lumber order, though it doesn't include the horizontal cap or base trim some board-and-batten designs add on top.