The calculation for a four seater dining set is straightforward once it is written down: take the room dimension, subtract 90cm for every side where someone will sit, and what remains is the largest table the room can hold. Applied honestly, that arithmetic rules out a great many tables that look as though they would fit.<\/p>\n
Most rooms that feel cramped at dinner are not too small. They contain a table that was chosen on its own dimensions rather than on the dimensions of the table plus the chairs plus the people. This calculator addresses that directly, and it produces the same answer whether the room is a separate dining room, the end of a through lounge or an open plan kitchen diner.<\/p>\n
Work in centimetres and measure the usable floor area, not the room’s nominal size. Usable means excluding a chimney breast, a radiator projection, a door swing and any fitted unit. Then apply the following.<\/p>\n
First, decide which sides of the table people will sit at. In a room where the table sits against a wall, that may be three sides. In the centre of a room, four. Second, subtract 90cm from the room dimension for each of those sides in that direction. For a table with seating on both long sides, subtract 180cm from the room’s width. Third, subtract a further 90cm where a walkway passes an unoccupied side.<\/p>\n
What is left is the maximum table footprint. If that figure is below 90cm in either direction, the room cannot take a fixed four seater table and a drop leaf, wall side or extending format should be considered instead.<\/p>\n
The table below applies the calculation to room sizes that occur frequently in UK housing. The results are the maximum table footprint, not a recommendation to fill it.<\/p>\n
| Room usable size<\/th>\n | Seating arrangement<\/th>\n | Maximum table footprint<\/th>\n | Suggested four seater format<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n |
|---|---|---|---|
| 240cm by 240cm<\/td>\n | Four sides, central<\/td>\n | 60cm by 60cm<\/td>\n | Drop leaf or wall side table only<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| 270cm by 270cm<\/td>\n | Four sides, central<\/td>\n | 90cm by 90cm<\/td>\n | Square 90cm table, slim chairs<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| 280cm by 300cm<\/td>\n | Four sides, central<\/td>\n | 100cm by 120cm<\/td>\n | Round 100cm or rectangular 120cm<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| 300cm by 320cm<\/td>\n | Four sides, central<\/td>\n | 120cm by 140cm<\/td>\n | Rectangular 120cm to 140cm<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| 250cm by 320cm<\/td>\n | Three sides, one against wall<\/td>\n | 70cm by 140cm<\/td>\n | Rectangular 130cm against the wall<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| 260cm by 400cm<\/td>\n | Four sides plus a walkway<\/td>\n | 80cm by 130cm<\/td>\n | Narrow rectangular 130cm by 80cm<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\nWhy shape changes the answer<\/h3>\nTwo tables of the same seating capacity can demand very different floor areas. A rectangular 120cm by 75cm table occupies 0.9 square metres. A round 110cm table occupies 0.95 square metres of nominal area but behaves as though it takes less, because the missing corners give back exactly the space where a person walking past would otherwise collide with the table.<\/p>\n That is the practical argument for round tables in tight rooms, and it is a real one. The counter argument is that a round table cannot be pushed against a wall without losing two of its four places, whereas a rectangle can sit against a wall and still seat three. In a room used for dining only occasionally, that flexibility often matters more than the corner clearance.<\/p>\n Square tables at 90cm to 100cm are the most space efficient way to seat four with equal comfort, and they suit genuinely square rooms and kitchen corners. Their limitation is that they cannot be extended in most designs, so a household that occasionally needs six seats will find them restrictive.<\/p>\n Chairs are part of the measurement<\/h3>\nThe 90cm clearance assumes a standard chair. Chairs vary considerably, and a chair with a deep seat, splayed rear legs or fixed arms will need more travel to pull out than a slim side chair. Where the room is tight, the chair choice can recover several centimetres.<\/p>\n Chairs that tuck fully under the table are worth seeking out in a small room, because a chair left projecting when not in use narrows the walkway permanently. Check the chair’s back height against the table’s apron: a chair back that is taller than the table edge will tuck under only if the seat clears the apron, and a table with a deep frame rail beneath the top will prevent some chairs tucking at all.<\/p>\n Benches are the exception worth considering. A bench pushed fully beneath the table takes no walkway space at all when not in use, which is why they suit narrow kitchen diners. The trade off is comfort over long meals and the difficulty of anyone in the middle getting out. Our dining benches UK<\/a> range works well on the wall side of a table with chairs on the open side. For chairs, the fabric dining chairs UK<\/a> and wooden dining chairs UK<\/a> selections differ meaningfully in their tuck under depth, so it is worth comparing the specifications.<\/p>\n A dining zone within an open plan kitchen diner is subject to an additional constraint: it sits on a route. People walk from the kitchen to the seating area past the table, often carrying things, and that route needs its own 90cm that cannot be shared with a chair pull out zone.<\/p>\n In practice this means an open plan dining zone needs to be treated as having one more clearance side than it appears to. A table with four occupied sides in the middle of an open plan space needs 90cm on all four for chairs, plus a further allowance where the main route runs. This is why open plan tables are often smaller than the apparent space suggests.<\/p>\n |