Why the published numbers are so far apart
We compared published guidance for a standard three-bedroom house. The spread is wide enough that following the wrong one leaves you either short or with forty spare boxes.
| Source | Estimate for a 3-bed house |
|---|---|
| RemovalReviews | Around 35 boxes, or 50 crates |
| ExtraSpace | 45 to 70 boxes |
| Boxtopia | Around 55 boxes |
| Barrons Removals | 80 to 100 boxes |
The reason is not that any of them is wrong. They are counting different things. Some count only cartons, some include crates. Some assume a decluttered house, some assume a lived-in one. And box sizes are not standard, so a count of fifty means nothing without knowing whether those are small, medium or large.
The practical answer is to stop looking for a total and start counting rooms.
The room-by-room method
Published room-by-room guidance is much more consistent than the whole-house totals. These are typical planning figures rather than a promise:
| Room | Typical range | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Kitchen | 10 to 15 | Consistently the heaviest room. Mostly small boxes |
| Master bedroom | 8 to 12 | Plus wardrobe cartons for hanging clothes |
| Other bedrooms | 5 to 8 each | More if a child’s room, less if barely used |
| Living room | 5 to 10 | Books push this up fast |
| Home office | 5 to 10 | Files and tech, mostly small boxes |
| Bathroom | 2 to 3 | The one room that never surprises anyone |
| Hall and cupboards | 3 to 7 | Coats, shoes, seasonal items |
| Loft, shed or garage | Highly variable | The single biggest source of underestimation |
Add 10 to 15 per cent to whatever total you reach. Running out halfway through a kitchen on a Tuesday evening costs you a trip across town and an hour of momentum, and unused flat boxes are far cheaper than that.
If your house has not had a clear-out in a decade, published guidance suggests adding around 20 per cent rather than 10.
Thinking about your own move?
Send us both addresses and your date. You will get a fixed written quote, usually within one working day, and an honest answer about whether your date is a busy one.
Sizes matter more than the count
Why it works this way is weight, not volume. A large box filled with books is unliftable and will fail at the base. A large box filled with duvets weighs almost nothing and is perfectly safe.
- Small boxes: books, crockery, tinned food, tools, small appliances, anything dense.
- Medium boxes: clothes, pans, toys, bathroom contents, most general household items.
- Large boxes: bedding, duvets, pillows, cushions, lampshades, soft furnishings.
- Wardrobe cartons: hanging clothes, straight off the rail. Allow one per rail section.
- Dish packs: double-walled, for kitchen fragiles. Two to four for a typical kitchen.
A workable starting mix for a three-bedroom house is roughly equal numbers of small and medium boxes with fewer large ones, plus wardrobe cartons and a couple of dish packs. Most households need more small boxes than they expect and fewer large ones.
What this looks like in an Edinburgh flat
Three local factors change the count, and none of them appears on a national calculator:
- Press cupboards and box rooms. Traditional Edinburgh flats often have deep built-in cupboards that hold considerably more than the room size suggests. These are consistently underestimated.
- No loft, no garage, no shed. Which cuts the count in the other direction. A tenement flat has nowhere for the twenty boxes of accumulated things a house generates.
- Weight matters more here than volume. Every box is carried down a stair rather than wheeled to a driveway, so the practical limit is what one person can carry safely round a half-landing. That argues for more boxes, filled less full.
Rough starting points by local property type, before you count rooms properly:
| Property | Starting estimate |
|---|---|
| Studio or one-bed tenement flat | Around 20 to 30 |
| Two-bed flat or colony | Around 35 to 45 |
| Three-bed house | Around 50 to 70 |
| Four-bed house with loft and garage | 75 plus |
Treat these as the first guess, then correct them room by room. The loft and the garage are where the estimate breaks.
Packing room by room without losing track
The sequence that keeps momentum:
- Start with the room you use least. Spare rooms, lofts, cupboards. It builds pace and the decisions are easy.
- Finish a room before starting another. Half-packed rooms are how things get lost between boxes.
- Label the top and one side, because on a stair the top is often the only face visible.
- Number the boxes per room, for example kitchen 1 of 12, so you know immediately if something is missing.
- Leave bedrooms until last. You are sleeping there until the night before.
- Pack a first-night box and mark it clearly. It travels with you, not in the van.
Fragile items in the kitchen need their own method rather than more paper. The technique for that is set out in our guide to packing plates and glassware.
Where to get the boxes
- Through your removal firm. Materials are usually delivered days ahead as part of a booked move, which is how packing services in Edinburgh work rather than as a separate purchase.
- Box suppliers and self-storage box shops. Consistent sizes, double-walled options, delivered flat.
- Reused box sellers. Same strength, lower cost, and better environmentally for a job you do once.
- Free from shops. Supermarkets and off-licences will often put boxes aside if you ask in advance. The catch is inconsistent sizes, which stack badly in a van, and thin walls that fail under weight.
- Local buy-and-sell groups, where someone who moved last month wants rid of forty boxes.
One caution on free boxes. They are genuinely fine for clothes, linens and light items. They are a poor choice for a kitchen carried down three flights, because a base failure on a stair is how a box of plates ends.
When counting boxes is not the right exercise
- If the move is being professionally packed, the crew brings what the survey allowed for and adjusts on the day.
- If you are moving a studio or single room, a dozen boxes and some bags will cover it, and precision is not worth the effort.
- If you are decluttering heavily first, count after the clear-out rather than before. The number will change substantially.
- If everything is going into storage, uniform box sizes matter more than the count, because they stack and a mixed pile does not.
Common questions about how many boxes you need
How many boxes do I need for a 3 bed house?
Published estimates range from roughly 35 to 100, which tells you the totals are unreliable. Counting room by room is more accurate: around 10 to 15 for a kitchen, 8 to 12 for a master bedroom, 5 to 8 for other bedrooms, 5 to 10 for a living room, and whatever the loft demands. Add 10 to 15 per cent on top.
How many boxes for a 1 bed flat?
Around 20 to 30 for a typical one-bedroom flat, weighted towards small and medium sizes. In an Edinburgh tenement, check the press cupboards before settling on a number, because deep built-in storage holds far more than the room size suggests.
Is it better to have too many boxes or too few?
Too many, comfortably. Running out mid-pack costs a trip and the momentum you had, whereas spare flat boxes cost very little and are easy to pass on. Most guidance recommends a buffer of around 10 to 15 per cent.
What size boxes should I use?
Small boxes for heavy things like books and crockery, medium for general household items and clothes, large for light bulky things like bedding. The most common packing mistake is a large box full of books, which becomes unliftable and fails at the base.
Can I use free supermarket boxes?
For clothes, linens and light items, yes. For a kitchen being carried down a tenement stair, they are a poor choice, because inconsistent sizes stack badly and thin single-walled cardboard can fail under weight at exactly the wrong moment.
How many boxes fit in a removal van?
It depends on the van and on how much furniture is going in alongside them, which is the real constraint. Box count alone is rarely what decides vehicle size, and we cover what does in our guide to removal van sizes by property.
Before you order
Walk the house with a notepad and count by room, including every cupboard, the loft and the shed. Add 10 to 15 per cent. Order more small boxes than feels right and fewer large ones. That process takes twenty minutes and beats any calculator, because it is the only one that has seen your kitchen.
More practical guides to moving in and around this city are collected in our Edinburgh moving guides.
Box estimates in this guide are drawn from published guidance from UK box suppliers and removal firms, compared on 3 August 2026. They are planning figures rather than guarantees, and every household differs. Where a survey has been carried out, the quantities allowed for in your quote will be more accurate than any general estimate.
