How to Measure for Brick Steps: Treads, Risers, Side Cheeks, and Net Area

Measuring brick steps means measuring each step on its own line, then adding the side cheeks and any landing. The fixture flight below has 3 steps, each 4 ft wide, with a tread depth of 1 ft and a riser height of 0.5 ft. Its tread and riser faces total 18 ft2, its two side cheeks add 6 ft2, and the full face area is 24 ft2, which counts as 162 modular bricks net.

What do you measure for brick steps?

Record the step measurements, the side cheeks, any landing, and the brick size before any counting starts: the number of steps, and the width, tread depth, and riser height of each step. Measure width across the front of the step, tread depth from the riser face to the nosing edge, and riser height from one tread surface to the next. Write the brick size beside the measurements, because the count at the end depends on it.

Count treads and risers separately. In the fixture the top tread is the arrival surface, so the flight has 3 treads and 3 riser faces. When a landing sits above the top tread, the flight gains one more riser face for the step up to the landing. That extra riser belongs on its own line, not inside the top step.

How do you measure each step?

Each step has two brick faces: the tread on top and the riser at the front. Measure both from the same step, then add them.

Tread face = step width x tread depth

Riser face = step width x riser height

Give a step its own line when its width, tread depth, or riser height differs from the others. One width carried across a flight that narrows toward the top understates the wide steps and overstates the narrow ones, and the error survives every later step. Do not add a separate strip for the nosing overhang. The tread depth already runs to the nosing edge, so a second nosing line would count the same strip twice.

How do you measure the side cheeks?

A side cheek is the stepped profile at one end of the flight. Measure it column by column, from the back step to the front. Each column is one tread deep, and its height is the height of the flight at that column: the back column stands the full flight height, and each column toward the front stands one riser lower.

Two side cheeks give 6 ft2. Add them to the 18 ft2 of tread and riser faces for a total face area of 24 ft2. A cheek that sits against a wall or is buried in fill is not a brick face, so leave it off the ledger and note why. A cheek counted twice, once per side when only one side shows brick, inflates the count by the full cheek area.

What about a landing?

A landing gets its own lines, separate from the steps. Measure its top surface and its exposed front face, then its side faces on the same column method used for the cheeks.

For a platform 4 ft wide and 3 ft deep, the top is 4 x 3 = 12 ft2, and a front face 0.5 ft high is 4 x 0.5 = 2 ft2, giving 14 ft2 before its side faces. Add the riser face from the top tread up to the landing surface on the riser line. In the fixture width and riser height, that riser is 4 x 0.5 = 2 ft2. A landing measured as one more step hides its depth, and a landing left off the ledger drops its whole top surface from the count.

How does face area become a brick count?

Apply the Brick Industry Association coverage rate for the brick size to the total face area. Modular brick at a 3/8 in joint counts 6.75 bricks per ft2 in running or stack bond, and the Association table rates exclude waste.

Net bricks = total face area x bricks per ft2

1. Add the ledger lines: 18 ft2 of tread and riser faces plus 6 ft2 of side cheeks gives 24 ft2.
2. Multiply by the modular rate: 24 x 6.75 = 162 bricks net.
3. Check the result against the 5 percent waste rule: 162 x 1.05 = 170.1, rounded up to 171 bricks.
4. Keep the net count and the waste-checked count on separate lines, so the ordering step can see both.

The waste check here is a check, not an order. The ordering guide sets the waste allowance for the actual order and records its basis.

How does the count check in metric units?

Convert the area, then apply the matching metric rate. The two routes must land on the same net count.

1. Convert the area: 24 x 0.09290304 = 2.2297 m2.
2. Convert the rate: 6.75 / 0.09290304 = 72.66 bricks per m2.
3. Multiply: 2.2297 x 72.66 = about 162 bricks.
4. If the two routes disagree, the conversion or the rate is wrong, and the count should wait until the mismatch is found.

What goes wrong if a side cheek is measured as one rectangle?

A single rectangle uses the full run times the full rise: 3 ft x 1.5 ft = 4.5 ft2 per side, against the true stepped profile of 3 ft2. The overstatement is 1.5 ft2 per side, 3 ft2 in total, which is 20.25 bricks at the net step. The rectangle fills the triangular notches above the steps with brick that is not there. The column method avoids the error because each column stops at the height of its own step.

A missed riser up to a landing causes the opposite error. At the fixture width and riser height, one missed riser drops 2 ft2 from the ledger, which is 13.5 bricks at the net step. Check the riser count against the tread count before closing the ledger: a flight ending at a landing has one more riser face than treads.

Does a smaller flight follow the same steps?

Yes. A flight of 2 steps, each 3 ft wide with a tread depth of 1 ft and a riser height of 0.5 ft, gives a tread face of 3 ft2 and a riser face of 1.5 ft2 per step, so 4.5 ft2 per step and 9 ft2 for both steps. Each side cheek has columns of 1 x 1.0 = 1.0 ft2 and 1 x 0.5 = 0.5 ft2, giving 1.5 ft2 per side and 3 ft2 for both sides. The total face area is 12 ft2, the net count is 81 modular bricks, and the 5 percent check gives 85.05, rounded up to 86 bricks. The steps are the same; only the numbers change.

What this guide does not decide

This guide settles a measurement and a net count for one fixture flight. It does not choose the brick grade, type, or mortar. Those choices belong to the project specification and to the brick steps guide. It does not set riser heights or tread depths, size a footing, price the order, or set a mortar quantity. It does not approve a step layout, and a layout that feels unsafe underfoot needs a design check before it is built, whatever the count says.