How many bricks are on a pallet?

UK packs are usually 400 or 500 bricks depending on the manufacturer, weighing roughly 1,000–1,300 kg. US cubes are typically around 500. Ordering in whole packs is normally cheaper than ordering loose.

How many bricks in a square metre of blockwork?

None — blockwork uses about 10 blocks per square metre. A 440 × 215 mm block with 10 mm joints has a 450 × 225 mm module, giving 9.88 per square metre.

How many bricks do I need?

Last reviewed 1 July 2026

Short answer

Sixty bricks per square metre for a single-skin wall in standard UK bricks with 10 mm joints, and 120 for a one-brick or cavity wall. In the US, modular brick works out at 6.86 per square foot per wythe. Multiply by the net wall area after deducting openings, then add 5–10% for waste.

Work it out for your project with the brick wall calculator →

Where 60 bricks per square metre comes from

A UK standard brick is 215 × 102.5 × 65 mm. With a 10 mm mortar joint on the bed and the perpend, it occupies a co-ordinating size of 225 × 75 mm on the wall face.

One square metre divided by 0.225 × 0.075 is 59.26 bricks. The industry specifies this as 60 per square metre, which builds in a small margin.

The figure only holds for a 10 mm joint. Change the joint and the answer changes — which is why deriving it from the geometry is safer than memorising it.

bricks per m² = 1 ÷ ((brick length + joint) × (brick height + joint))

Units per area by type

Coverage of common masonry units
Unit	Size	Joint	Per m² per skin	Per ft² per wythe
UK standard brick	215 × 65 mm	10 mm	59.3 (specify 60)	5.51
UK block	440 × 215 mm	10 mm	9.88 (specify 10)	0.92
US modular brick	7⅝ × 2¼ in	⅜ in	73.8	6.86
US queen brick	7⅝ × 2¾ in	⅜ in	62.4	5.80
US CMU	15⅝ × 7⅝ in	⅜ in	12.1	1.125

Wall thickness doubles it

A single skin, or half-brick wall, is one brick thick — 102.5 mm in the UK. That is the 60 per square metre figure.

A one-brick solid wall, or a cavity wall with two skins, is two skins thick and needs 120 per square metre. A cavity wall also needs wall ties at around 2.5 per square metre.

It is easy to price a boundary wall at half its real cost by forgetting this, because the wall looks like one wall from the outside.

Deducting openings

Calculate the gross wall area: length × height.
For each opening, multiply width × height, then multiply by how many of that size there are.
Subtract the total opening area from the gross area to get the net area.
Multiply the net area by the units per square metre and by the number of skins.
Add the waste allowance and round up.

Safety notice: Openings still need lintels

Deducting an opening removes the bricks but not the requirement to support the wall above it. Lintels have to be sized for the load and given adequate bearing at each end, and they are a design item, not an estimating one.

Worked example

A garden wall 8 m long and 1.8 m high, single skin, with a 1 m × 1.8 m gate opening.

Gross area = 8 × 1.8 = 14.4 m². Opening = 1 × 1.8 = 1.8 m². Net area = 12.6 m².

Bricks = 12.6 × 59.26 = 747 before waste. With 5% waste, 785 bricks — two packs of 500 with a reasonable number spare, since a pack is 500.

Mortar for 785 bricks is around 0.44 m³, which needs roughly 0.7 tonnes of building sand and 140 kg of cement at 1:5.