Will It Fit? How to Measure for a Sofa Before You Buy

Why sofas get stuck

Most sofas that get sent back fit the room perfectly. They just never reached it. The door, the hallway turn or the lift stopped them.

A product page lists width, depth and height. None of those tells you whether the sofa can tilt through a doorway. Delivery crews angle a sofa to get it in, so the number that matters is its diagonal depth. Retailers such as Crate & Barrel and Pottery Barn build their delivery guides around it.

The second cause is the route. People measure the front door and forget the hallway behind it, the stair turn and the lift.

Checking takes about 15 minutes and three sets of measurements: the room, the route and the sofa.

What you need

A metal tape measure, a roll of painter's tape, a pen and your phone for notes. A stiff, locking tape lets one person measure a doorway alone.

Step 1: Measure the room

1. Measure the wall where the sofa will sit.
2. Note anything that sticks out: radiators, skirting boards (baseboards), sockets and window sills.
3. Mark the sofa's width and depth on the floor with painter's tape.
4. Walk around the taped outline for a day. If you keep stepping on it, the sofa is too big.

As a working guide, leave about 30 inches (75 cm) for a main walkway and about 16 inches (40 cm) between the sofa and a coffee table. These are common rules of thumb, not fixed rules, and a tight room can go a little lower on a path you rarely use.

Step 2: Measure the route

Start at the street and walk the path the sofa will take. At every point, write down the narrowest width and the lowest height.

• Building entrance and your front door. Measure the opening inside the frame, not the door itself.
• Hallways, including any turn. Note what is fixed to the walls, such as light fittings and handrails.
• Stairs. Width, ceiling height at the top and bottom, and the size of the landing.
• Lift. Door width, door height and the depth inside.
• The room door.

Step 3: Find the sofa's diagonal depth

Some retailers list diagonal depth. If yours does not, measure it on a showroom model or ask the seller.

1. Lay a straight edge from the highest point of the sofa's back to the front of the arm.
2. Measure from the bottom back corner of the sofa up to that straight edge.
3. That distance is the diagonal depth.

Step 4: Compare the numbers

The key test: diagonal depth must be less than the doorway width. If it is, the sofa can be tilted through. The furniture fit calculator runs the same check for the room and the door in one go.

If the numbers do not work

You have four options before giving up on a sofa.

• Remove the feet. Most unscrew and save a few centimetres.
• Take the door off its hinges. This adds the thickness of the door to the opening. In a rental, ask your landlord first.
• Choose a modular sofa. It arrives in boxes, one seat at a time.
• Choose a narrower model. Apartment-size sofas are built for this; how to choose furniture for a small apartment covers what to look for.

Products that can help

What to do next

A sofa is usually the largest thing you own, so it decides where everything else goes. If a desk has to share the room, see how to build a home office in a small bedroom. If you are moving and want to know what the whole job costs, try the moving cost calculator.