Cut List Optimizer
Plan your cuts before you touch the saw
Stock available
Pieces needed
How to use this tool
Choose Linear for boards, lumber, pipe, or conduit — anything cut to length from a straight stock piece. Choose Sheet Goods for plywood or panel material that gets cut into rectangles in two dimensions. Add every stock size you have on hand, add every piece you need to cut, then hit Optimize. The tool works out the layout that uses the fewest boards or sheets.
Why kerf matters
Every cut removes a sliver of material equal to your blade’s thickness — that’s the kerf. On a long cut list, ignoring it adds up fast: skip it and you can come up short on your last piece even though the math “should” have worked. A typical circular saw or table saw blade runs around 0.125 in (1/8 in); thin-kerf blades run closer to 0.09 in. Check your blade if you’re not sure.
Why this beats guessing
Laying out cuts by eye almost always wastes more material than it needs to, especially on sheet goods where the layout has two dimensions to get wrong instead of one. Running the numbers first means fewer boards bought, fewer sheets wasted, and no surprise trip back to the lumber yard mid-project.