How many moving boxes do I need?

One of our totes holds 2.5 cubic feet, which is close to what a heavy-duty medium box holds. So the tote counts below are also a fair answer if you are buying cardboard instead.

The cardboard column is lower because a medium box holds slightly more than a tote. It is volume for volume, not one for one.

How long you have lived there. This is the big one. Five years in the same house roughly doubles what two years produces, in the same square footage. If you have not moved in a decade, size up without thinking about it.

Books. A shelf of books fills a box faster than any other thing people own, and it hits the weight limit long before the box is full. Count each full bookcase as three or four boxes on its own.

The kitchen. Always more than you think. A normally stocked kitchen is six to ten boxes by itself once the plates are wrapped and the pans are nested.

The garage, shed, or storage unit. These sit outside the bedroom count entirely, and they are the single most common reason an estimate comes up short. If the garage is going with you, add its contents separately.

Furniture does not go in boxes, so a home that is mostly furniture needs fewer than its size suggests. Same for anything you are selling, donating, or leaving. If you are genuinely culling before the move rather than promising yourself you will, take a size off.

Take the larger one. Running out mid-pack means a store trip on a day you have none to spare, and part-packed rooms are how things get lost. Spare totes stack 5 high against a wall and take up almost no floor.

Compare the package prices to see what sizing up actually costs. It is usually less than the gap between two trips to buy more boxes.