How Many Tons Are in a Cubic Yard of Asphalt?

A cubic yard is 27 cubic feet. At 145 pounds per cubic foot, 27 times 145 is 3,915 pounds, or about 1.96 tons of compacted hot mix. Loose mix in a truck is a different volume. Gravel is often planned near 1.4 tons per cubic yard.

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The cubic-yard multiplication

A cubic yard is 3 feet by 3 feet by 3 feet, which is 27 cubic feet. Compacted hot mix is planned at 145 pounds per cubic foot, so 27 times 145 equals 3,915 pounds. Divide 3,915 by 2,000 and you get 1.9575, which is about 1.96 tons per cubic yard. That figure is a planning estimate for compacted hot mix. The plant ticket is the real weight. People get into trouble when they take a gravel quantity in cubic yards and multiply by 1.96 as if the stone were asphalt. Gravel is often planned near 1.4 tons per cubic yard, and the quarry ticket is the real weight for that stone. The two materials do not share a tonnage just because both can be poured into a yard box.

Loose volume is not compacted volume

Mix in the truck is hot and loose. Rolling compacts it into the mat, so a cubic yard of loose mix does not become a cubic yard of finished pavement. The 1.96 ton figure belongs to the compacted density, which is what the area formula uses. If you only know the square feet and the inches, you do not need cubic yards at all. Tons equal length times width times inches divided by 12, times 145, divided by 2,000. Convert to yards only when a note was written that way. Divide cubic feet by 27, or multiply cubic yards by 27, and keep compacted and loose labeled. A ticket that weighs the truck is still the authority over either volume estimate.

Use the yard figure as a translator

Suppose a note says 10 cubic yards of compacted hot mix. At about 1.96 tons per yard, 10 times 1.96 is about 19.6 tons. That is the planning weight, not a scale reading. If the same person also has an area, check them against each other. One thousand square feet at three inches is 1,000 times 0.25, or 250 cubic feet. Divide 250 by 27 and you get about 9.3 cubic yards, times about 1.96 tons, which lands near the familiar 18.1 tons. When the yard count and the area count disagree, the measurements disagree. Do not average them into a fake precision. Remeasure the length, the width, and the thickness.

A practical sequence

Multiply 27 cubic feet by 145 pounds to get 3,915 pounds.
Divide 3,915 by 2,000 to get about 1.96 tons per compacted cubic yard.
Keep gravel near 1.4 tons per cubic yard on a separate line.
Call both figures planning estimates and trust the plant or quarry ticket.

The mistake to skip

Multiplying a gravel cubic-yard quantity by 1.96 as if the stone were compacted hot mix.

Questions people ask

Is asphalt about two tons per cubic yard?

About 1.96 tons, which people sometimes round to 2. The exact planning product is 27 times 145, or 3,915 pounds, divided by 2,000. Use 1.96 when you are checking a compacted volume. Loose mix in the truck is not the same cubic yard. The plant ticket is the real weight.

Why is gravel lower than 1.96?

Because it is a different material. A common planning default for gravel is about 1.4 tons per cubic yard, not the 145 pounds per cubic foot used for compacted hot mix. The quarry ticket uses that stone's real unit weight. Do not swap the two factors in one order.

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