This page explains how to get a quote for a cabinet, bookcase or custom door order and what to expect to pay. You have several options:
If you are planning a kitchen renovation and trying to figure out what custom cabinets will actually cost, you have probably already found that the numbers online range from confusingly low to surprisingly high. National averages pulled from aggregator sites are not particularly useful when you are trying to budget a real project in a real house. We are going to tell you what our projects actually cost and what makes that number move up or down.
For fully custom kitchen cabinets supplied by us, here are some typical prices (semi-custom will cost less):
Per linear foot, fully custom kitchen cabinetry run roughly $550 to $1,200 per linear foot installed, depending on wood species, door style, finish complexity, and layout. A standard 10×10 kitchen has approximately 20 linear feet of cabinetry with a midpoint range of around $25,000 installed. Note that we may be able to arrange for installation, depending on your location, but you may also prefer to find a local contractor or even install yourself.
Those prices include design, materials, production, finishing, delivery, and installation. They do not include countertops, appliances, plumbing, electrical, or flooring.
You will see figures like “$500 to $1,500 per linear foot” cited across the internet, and that range is technically accurate at a national level. But it is almost useless for planning a specific project because it blends the cost of a basic painted maple kitchen in a rural area with the cost of a full inset white oak kitchen in a large city into one number.
What actually determines your number is a combination of where you are, who builds the cabinets, what materials you choose, how complex the layout is, and whether the installer is the same company that built the cabinets or a separate contractor. Our costs sit toward the middle of the national range. More expensive than rural midwest markets, but less expensive than coastal markets with a high premium, such as New York City or San Francisco.
The most reliable way to get a number for your specific project is a design consultation based on the measurements of your space, your preferences, so that we can give you a real quote. We offer quotes at no charge with no obligation.
Understanding the variables that drive cabinet cost lets you make intentional choices rather than being surprised by the final number. Here is what moves the needle most.
This is the single biggest cost variable in custom cabinetry. Paint-grade Poplar or Soft Maple, which is what most painted kitchens use, are the most economical choices. The wood disappears under paint, so the species matters less than the smoothness of the substrate. Cherry, Hickory, and Hard Maple sit in the middle of the range. White Oak and Walnut sit at the top. Please note that “soft” Maple isn’t much softer than “hard” Maple, so it is still a fairly hard wood.
To give you a sense of the range: a 30-linear-foot kitchen in painted Poplar will cost meaningfully less than the same 30-linear-foot kitchen in rift-cut White Oak with a natural finish, even if every other variable is identical. The species premium on a full kitchen can be $4,000 to $10,000 or more depending on the size of the project.
If White Oak is on your list, our post on White Oak kitchen cabinets covers the material in detail, including the difference between rift-cut and quarter-sawn and how they affect both appearance and cost.
Full overlay doors, where the door covers most of the face frame, are the standard in most modern kitchens and are the most economical door construction. Shaker-style full overlay doors are particularly efficient to produce and represent solid value.
Inset doors, which sit flush within the face frame opening rather than covering it, add roughly 15 to 25 percent to the door component of the cost. They require tighter tolerances, more adjustment time during installation, and more precise construction throughout. The result looks exceptional — with a look more like furniture than cabinetry — but the premium is real.
Raised panel doors cost more than shaker or flat slab doors because of the additional machining and setup time involved. The cost difference is meaningful but not dramatic on a full kitchen. Browse our full door style selection to see what the options look like before your consultation.
A simple galley kitchen with one long run on each wall and no island is less expensive to build and install than an L-shaped kitchen with an island, a tall pantry column, and two blind corners. Each specialty cabinet, whether it is a pull-out trash unit, a blind corner solution, a Lazy Susan, or an appliance garage, adds both material and labor cost.
Ceiling height is a factor too. Standard upper cabinets top out around 84-90 inches with 8-foot ceilings. If you want to take cabinets all the way to a 9 or 10-foot ceiling, you need either separate stacker units on top or full custom tall uppers. Both add cost, but are worth it visually. Our guide to floor-to-ceiling cabinetry covers this in detail.
A standard painted or stained finish is included in the base price. Specialty finishes, including glazed, cerused, wire-brushed, or multi-step decorative finishes, add production time and cost. Painted finishes require more surface preparation and coats than stained finishes to achieve a smooth result because any imperfection in the substrate shows through paint in a way it does not with stain.
Hardware is one of those line items that surprises people when they add it up. A kitchen with 40 doors and drawers at $10 per pull costs $400 in hardware. The same kitchen with $45 pulls costs $1,800. Quality hardware from companies like Rejuvenation, Rocky Mountain Hardware, or Waterworks is genuinely better than cheap hardware, but the premium is real and it scales with the number of doors and drawers in the kitchen.
Installing cabinets in a new construction home with plumb walls and level floors takes less time than installing in a 150-year-old farmhouse where nothing is square and the ceiling drops an inch over the length of the wall. Both kitchens can look perfect when done, but the older home requires more time for scribing, shimming, and fitting on site. That time is reflected in the installation cost.
Stock cabinets from a home improvement store typically run $75 to $250 per linear foot for the cabinets alone, plus $50 to $200 per linear foot for installation, so $125 to $450 per linear foot all-in. A 20-linear-foot kitchen comes out to $2,500 to $9,000 installed. Stock cabinets are built to standard sizes and use particleboard boxes and stapled drawer construction.
Semi-custom cabinets from a showroom dealer typically run $200 to $600 per linear foot for the cabinets, plus installation, for a total of roughly $250 to $800 per linear foot all-in. The construction is generally better than stock, often with plywood boxes. The limitation is standard sizing with filler strips and a limited selection of door styles, molding and finishes.
Custom-built cabinets from a shop that builds in-house run $550 to $1,200 per linear foot all-in. The construction is solid hardwood and plywood throughout. Built to your exact dimensions. The price for full custom is higher, but the gap between custom and high-end semi-custom is narrower than most people expect.
One reason cabinet quotes are hard to compare is that companies include different things. When you get a quote from us, here is exactly what is covered:
What is not included: countertops, appliances, plumbing, electrical, flooring, and demolition of existing cabinetry. These need to be completed in preparation for the delivery and installation of new cabinetry.
The upfront price of custom cabinets is real, and we are not going to pretend otherwise. But there is a way of thinking about that price that puts it in a different context.
A stock kitchen that costs $6,000 installed and needs replacement in 12 to 15 years costs approximately $1.10 to $1.37 per day. A custom kitchen that costs $30,000 installed and is still in excellent condition in 40 years costs approximately $2.05 per day. The difference is about 75 cents per day, roughly the cost of a cup of coffee, to go from particleboard and stapled corners to solid hardwood and dovetail joinery in the room you use most in your home.
We are not making this argument to justify a number. We are making it because it is how our customers who have had our cabinets for 20 or 30 years consistently describe the decision in retrospect. The price was real when they paid it. The cabinets still look right and function correctly decades later. On that timeline the investment was sound. When you go to sell your home, it is unlikely you will need a major cabinet renovation, saving time and money.
Not every project requires full custom. If your kitchen has standard dimensions and a straightforward layout, our semi-custom line delivers the same solid hardwood construction and dovetail drawer boxes at a meaningfully lower price, with lead times of 6 to 8 weeks rather than 8 to 12 for full custom.
Semi-custom is not a compromise on construction quality. The wood is still solid hardwood. The drawers are still dovetail. The finish is still sprayed. What you give up is the ability to specify non-standard dimensions or unusual wood species. For many kitchens in the 8 to 10 foot ceiling standard-dimension range, semi-custom produces an excellent result at a price that makes sense.
Islands are typically priced separately from the wall run because they are more complex to build and install. An island with a single-width base costs less than a large double-sided island with a prep sink, drawers on multiple sides, and a seating overhang. Island pricing is included in your overall quote after the design is developed. It is not hidden, but it is a separate line item rather than being folded into the per-linear-foot number.
Yes, meaningfully. Choosing paint-grade Poplar over White Oak can save $4,000 to $8,000 on a full kitchen. Choosing a standard Shaker door over inset construction saves 15 to 25 percent on the door component. Choosing mid-range hardware over premium hardware can save $800 to $1,500 on a typical kitchen. We walk through these tradeoffs during the design consultation so you can make informed choices about where to spend and where to save.
The best way to evaluate a cabinet quote is to understand exactly what it includes. Is installation included? Is hardware included? Is the price for cabinets only or cabinets plus countertops? Once you are comparing equivalent scopes, the price tells you something. A quote that is dramatically lower than others for equivalent scope is usually a signal of lower construction quality, not greater efficiency. A quote that is much higher might include services or materials that others are not including. Get a quote from us and compare it directly.
The ranges in this post are as accurate as we can make them for typical projects in 2026. But your kitchen is specific, and the only way to get a number you can actually plan around is a consultation with your space measured and your priorities understood.
We offer free design consultations. Request a free quote online and leave a phone number where we can call you to discuss the details.
