How This Calculator Works
This calculator prices siding by multiplying your home’s wall area by a per-square-foot installed rate for the material you pick. Enter your wall area directly if you have a measurement or an old quote, or switch to “Estimate from perimeter” and enter your home’s perimeter in linear feet along with its number of stories. Perimeter mode multiplies your perimeter by 10 feet for every story, an assumed wall height per story that one of this page’s rate sources publishes as its own standard method. A 200-linear-foot perimeter on a single story home works out to 2,000 sq ft of wall area, which is why that scenario is this calculator’s default. On a 2-story home, the same perimeter doubles to roughly 4,000 sq ft, since siding has to wrap both stories, not just the ground floor.
Siding is priced by wall area, not roof area, which is a different surface entirely from what this site’s roof replacement and metal roof calculators price. This calculator doesn’t reuse either of those tools’ footprint-to-roof-area geometry, which converts a home’s footprint into sloped roof surface area using pitch; that math answers a roofing question, not a siding one. Material choice is the biggest lever on price here: vinyl is the cheapest and most common option, aluminum runs close behind it, fiber cement and wood cost more, and stucco sits at the top.
Methodology
Every number on this page links to where it came from. Four of five material rates blend two independent sources’ own midpoints, rounded to the nearest $0.50; wood is single-sourced, disclosed below. Figures verified July 2026.
Material Installation Rates
Two sources, each publishing a price-per-square-foot range by siding material:hover.to/blog/house-siding-cost, checked 2026-07-17 (published 2026-01-05), andmodernize.com/siding/cost-calculator, checked 2026-07-17 (2026 per-material table). Each material’s rate below is the average of the two sources’ own midpoints, rounded to the nearest $0.50:
| Material | Hover.to | Modernize | Blended Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vinyl | $4–12/sq ft | $4.50–8.20/sq ft | $7.00/sq ft |
| Aluminum | $6–10/sq ft | $5.60–10.30/sq ft | $8.00/sq ft |
| Fiber Cement | $6–15/sq ft | $4.70–8.50/sq ft | $8.50/sq ft |
| Wood | excluded, range too wide | $6.90–13.90/sq ft | $10.40/sq ft |
| Stucco | $7–17/sq ft | $9.30–16.90/sq ft | $12.50/sq ft |
Wood is single-sourced to Modernize: Hover.to’s published wood range was too wide to treat as comparable to the other four materials, so rather than force an average against a range that wide, this calculator uses Modernize’s own midpoint directly with no blending.
Perimeter-to-Wall-Area Rule
Modernize (same URL above) states its standard method for estimating wall square footage from a home’s perimeter: multiply perimeter by 10 feet per story. This calculator uses that same rule whenever you estimate from perimeter instead of entering a measured wall area directly.
Why Engineered Wood and Steel Are Omitted
Engineered wood and steel siding are both real, commonly quoted materials, but neither appears as an option on this page. Neither is covered by both rate sources above in a way that supports a comparable 2-source blend, and every material that is included here clears that bar. Rather than estimate a rate from a single source, or substitute a similar material’s figure as a stand-in, this calculator leaves both out until a second corroborating source is found.
Methodology last updated 2026-07-17. Every rate and blend above lives as asourceNote next to its value in this site’s underlying rate data. Found a source that’s gone stale or a blend you think is wrong? Contact uswith the page and the number.
What Drives Siding Cost
Material is the dominant factor, the same way it is for roofing. Vinyl stays the cheapest and most common option for a reason: low material cost, straightforward installation, and minimal maintenance. Fiber cement and wood both cost more and each brings its own maintenance profile, fiber cement for its weight and cutting requirements, wood for ongoing painting or staining. Stucco costs the most per square foot here and is typically chosen for climate and architectural style reasons as much as for looks.
Wall area scales the bill directly, and it’s worth getting right: an inaccurate perimeter estimate compounds across your entire home’s exterior, unlike a single mismeasured room. Stories only matters in perimeter mode, where it roughly doubles wall area for a 2-story home versus a 1-story home with the same footprint perimeter. Homeowners who are already planning aroof replacementoften time siding work to the same project, since both jobs need scaffolding or staging around the exterior of the home.
Worked Example
Take this calculator’s own default scenario: a 2,000 sq ft wall area entered directly, vinyl siding. That’s 2,000 sq ft at $7.00 per sq ft, or$14,000. Apply the Low/High spread (0.85x to 1.15x, the same symmetric band used across this site’s calculators) and you get a Low estimate of$11,900, a High estimate of $16,100, and a$14,000 midpoint to budget around. Switch that same wall area to stucco at $12.50/sq ft and the subtotal climbs to $25,000. Move a 2-story home’s 200-linear-foot perimeter into “Estimate from perimeter” mode and wall area doubles to roughly 4,000 sq ft, which doubles the price at any material. Try it above with your own home’s numbers.