How much paint for a 14x14 room?
A 14x14 room puts 412 sq ft of wall in front of you and 2.35 gallons of paint on the receipt, 2.59 with waste, which is why the third can is not optional.
A 14x14 ft room with 8-foot ceilings needs 2.35 gallons of paint for two coats — buy 3 × 1-gallon cans. That is 448 sq ft of gross wall, 412 sq ft after deducting one door (21 sq ft) and one window (15 sq ft), covered twice against 350 sq ft per gallon. With the standard 10% waste buffer it comes to 2.59 gallons, about $120 of paint. Having it painted runs about $575 for the walls, or $1,061 with the ceiling and trim.
Rates and coverage figures updated August 2026. Compiled 2026 from sources last updated 2023–2026.What to actually buy
- 3 × 1-gallon cans of wall color — $120, leaving 0.41 gal spare.
- On the walls, rounding up to 3 full gallons instead costs $120 and leaves 0.41 gal you will not use.
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What a 14x14 room is, and what that means for the job
The cut-in on a 14x14 is 56 ft of ceiling line with nothing to break it up. Four walls of 14 ft, 196 sq ft of floor, and the room is usually a second primary bedroom, a den, or the dining room in an older house. There is no short wall to warm up on. If it is a den, expect two doors rather than one, an entry and a closet, and remember that each door is wall you subtract.
This size shares its perimeter with a 12x16: both measure 56 ft around, both come to 412 sq ft of wall, both need 2.35 gallons, and the 12x16 gets there with 4 sq ft less floor. Whether the ceiling joins the job depends on what the room does. A bedroom ceiling gets rolled because you lie under it and can see every roller lap from the pillow; a den ceiling usually gets left alone while the white is still clean. Either way it is another 196 sq ft and its own can.
The numbers behind the answer
| Ceiling height | Gross wall | Net wall | 1 coat | 2 coats | 2 coats + waste |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 ft | 448 | 412 | 1.18 | 2.35 | 2.59 |
| 9 ft | 504 | 468 | 1.34 | 2.67 | 2.94 |
| 10 ft | 560 | 524 | 1.50 | 2.99 | 3.29 |
The arithmetic is worth seeing once: 448 sq ft of gross wall comes from 2 × (14 + 14) × 8 ft. Take off 21 sq ft for the door and 15 for the window and you have 412 sq ft to cover. Two coats is 824 sq ft of coverage, and at 350 sq ft per gallon that is 2.35 gallons. Every figure on this page comes from that one calculation.
A 14x14 room needs exactly the same paint as a 12x16 (192 sq ft of floor). All of them measure 56 feet around, so all of them have 412 sq ft of wall to cover and all of them take 2.35 gallons — even though the 14x14 has 196 sq ft of floor and the 12x16 has 192. Wall paint follows the perimeter, not the floor area. Stretching a room in one direction while shrinking it in the other changes how much carpet you buy and not how much paint.
What to buy
Three gallons, $120. Two of them go on the walls and the third is mostly reserve, since you need 2.59 with waste and about 0.4 gallon comes home sealed. Give that leftover a job. The inside of the reach-in closet is wall the 412 sq ft never counted, and one coat of it fits inside 0.4 gallon with room left, so do it while the room is empty and the can is already open.
Painting the ceiling and trim too
| Surface | Area | Paint, 2 coats | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Walls | 412 sq ft net | 2.59 gal | 3 × 1-gallon cans |
| Ceiling | 196 sq ft | 1.23 gal | 1 × 1-gallon can + 1 × quart |
| Trim and baseboard | 53 linear ft | 0.23 gal | 1 × quart |
What changes the answer
Openings are the lever here, and they move opposite to most instincts, because every window and door is wall you never paint. A second window takes 2.35 down to 2.26, and a closet door another 0.12, so a den with two windows and two doors needs 2.15 gallons, 2.36 with waste: the one honest way this room finishes on two gallons and two quarts. Everything else pushes up. Orange peel costs about 8%, knockdown 27%, and a 9 ft ceiling asks 2.67 gallons. Count your real openings in the room planner first.
| Change | Paint needed | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Baseline | 2.35 gal | the figure this page answers with |
| 9 ft ceiling | 2.67 gal | +0.32 gal |
| 10 ft ceiling | 2.99 gal | +0.64 gal |
| Orange-peel texture | 2.54 gal | +0.18 gal |
| Knockdown texture | 3.00 gal | +0.64 gal |
| Three coats | 3.53 gal | +1.18 gal |
| A second window | 2.27 gal | −0.09 gal — an opening removes wall you would have had to cover |
| No window at all | 2.44 gal | +0.09 gal |
Doing it yourself against hiring it out
| Route | What you pay | What it takes |
|---|---|---|
| Do it yourself | $120 of paint, plus roughly $24 of sundries | 3 × 1-gallon cans, one weekend |
| Hire it out | $575 for walls only | about 7.5 painter-hours |
| Hire it out, full room | $1,061 with ceiling and trim | walls, ceiling and 53 ft of trim |
A single room can also fall under a painter's job minimum, which runs $250–$500 whatever the square footage covers — mobilizing a crew costs the same for one room as for five. If you are pricing work rather than buying paint, the painting estimate calculator builds the full line-itemed bid.
A 14x14 room, answered
How much paint does a 14x14 room take?
Three gallons, because two coats need 2.35 and waste pushes that to 2.59. Four 14 ft walls make 56 ft of perimeter; at an 8 ft ceiling that is 448 sq ft, less 21 sq ft for the door and 15 for the window, so 412 sq ft gets paint. Rolled twice, that is 824 sq ft of coverage against 350 sq ft per gallon. What is left in the third can becomes your touch-up stock.
Does a 14x14 room need the same paint as a 12x16?
Yes. Both need 2.35 gallons, because both rooms measure 56 ft around. The 14x14 has 196 sq ft of floor and the 12x16 has 192, but floor area is not the surface you are painting. Wall paint tracks perimeter times ceiling height, so two rooms with the same distance around and the same 8 ft ceiling need identical paint no matter how differently they are shaped. More on the perimeter rule.
How much does it cost to paint a 14x14 room?
About $120 in paint, three gallons at $40, plus supplies. A contractor repainting the 412 sq ft of wall bids near $575, in the lower half of the $1.00 to $3.00 per sq ft band for interior repaint work. At this size you are clear of the $250 to $500 job minimum that makes single small rooms quote oddly. Cheaper paint at $20 a gallon exists, but thin paint often turns two coats into three.
Will 2 gallons and 2 quarts cover a 14x14 room?
It is 0.09 gallons short, so no. Two gallons plus two quarts is 2.50 gallons and the padded requirement is 2.59. Three quarts would get you to 2.75 and would work, but three quarts at roughly $16 each is $48 against $40 for the gallon they nearly equal. Buy the third gallon instead, keep the leftover sealed, and write the room name on the lid.
Sources and method
Coverage rates come from Sherwin-Williams and Benjamin Moore product data sheets; cost ranges were compiled in August 2026 from HomeGuide and Angi/HomeAdvisor, whose own pages date from 2023 to 2026. Angi owns HomeAdvisor, so those are one source and not two. Quantities on this page assume 350 sq ft per gallon per coat on smooth primed drywall, a 21 sq ft door and a 15 sq ft window; sources put windows anywhere from 10 to 16 sq ft, so change the opening counts in the calculator if yours differ. The full constants are on the paint coverage chart, and the cost basis is set out on interior painting cost per square foot.
This is an estimate for planning, not a quote. Measure your own room before buying.