Cabinet Doors 101 | How to measure for one-half-inch overlay Single and Double Cabinet Doors

In this video, we’ll explain one-half-inch overlay cabinet doors, how to measure cabinet openings, and how to calculate the proper door sizes for those cabinet openings.

Hi, my name’s Brady and I’ll explain the one-half inch overlay concept, and how you can be sure of ordering cabinet doors of the exact sizes your project needs.

First, I’ll show what we mean by one-half overlay.

While cabinet makers sometimes use different overlays, the one-half inch overlay is by far the most often used.

In most cases, one-half inch overlay means that the cabinet door is larger than the cabinet opening, on all four sides, by one-half inch.

The video playing shows a single cabinet door covering the cabinet opening, with the one-half inch overlay outlined. Notice the outline is one-half inch from the opening on all four sides.

Although most cabinet doors are single cabinet doors, some cabinet openings are wider and use double cabinet doors.

When two cabinet doors are used to cover the opening the one-half inch overlay applies to only three sides of each cabinet door.

On the side where the double doors meet, in the center of the opening, there is no overlay.

The picture at right shows how double cabinet doors mounted, with one-half inch overlay, cover the cabinet opening.

Now we’ll go over the process of measuring a cabinet opening for a single door, and calculating the door size needed to cover that opening with one-half inch overlay.

When using a half-inch overlay and a single cabinet door to cover the cabinet opening, just add the one-half-inch overlay, to the left side, the right side, the top, and the bottom.

So, an opening width of twelve inches will use a cabinet door with a width of thirteen inches.

The height of the cabinet door, with one-half inch overlay, will be the opening height plus one inch.

Now let’s look at wider cabinet openings that need double cabinet doors.

Here is a description of how to calculate the proper sizes for double doors, with one-half inch overlay.

First, measure the width and height of the cabinet opening.
Because we’re using two doors to cover the opening, we need to divide the opening width by two.

Unlike using a single door, double doors only have the half-inch overlay to three sides, the top, the bottom, and one side.

Remember, the width of the double door only overlays the opening on one side and not in the center, where the doors will meet.

There is one additional point to consider with double doors, that we’ll explain now.

If the double doors don’t have a small gap between them, they’ll touch when closing.

To allow the doors to close without touching, we reduce the width of each door slightly.

The normal width subtraction is one-sixteenth inch.

Here is the formula used to order the correct size of double doors.

For this example, we’ll assume the cabinet opening is 30 inches wide and 26 ½ inches high.

Dividing the 30-inch opening width by 2 equals 15-inches.

Next, subtracting 1-sixteenth from 15-inches, equals 14 15/16 inches.

Finally adding the 1-half inch overlay gives a final door width of 15 7/16 inches for each of the double doors.

Because the height of the cabinet door will overlay the opening on both top and bottom, the correct height of the door will be the opening height plus one-inch.

So, for an opening of 30” by 26 1/2 “, the proper size for double doors would be 15 7/16” by 27 1/2 “, for each door.

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