Concrete delivery price dataset

What a yard costs, by how many you order

National figures, 3,000 psi, 15 miles from the plant, inside the unloading window.

The practical consequence runs in both directions. If you are below the 5-yard minimum, the extra yards that get you to it are close to free — which is a reason to pour the path at the same time as the pad. And if you are just above it, shaving the order to save material can cost more than it saves.

The charges nobody quotes up front

Short-load surcharge

Charged per yard below about 5. The truck, the driver and the round trip cost the plant the same however little is on board, so they charge for the yards that are missing.

Standby time

The price includes roughly 7 minutes a yard for unloading; past that it bills by the minute. On the default order, taking 90 minutes instead of the expected 40 takes the bill from $1,194 to $1,381. It is the most avoidable charge here — it is avoided by being ready before the truck arrives, not while it waits.

Mileage beyond the free radius

Most plants include about ten miles and charge per mile beyond it. It is why the nearest plant is often the cheapest delivered even when its list price is not the lowest, and the delivered figure is the only one that matters.

Mix strength

Those factors are our estimate of the step a plant charges between grades. The practical point is that the step is small and the difference in durability is not, so a driveway or anything that will freeze and thaw is worth specifying rather than accepting whatever the plant quotes by default.

Line items

There is no labour line on this page and there should not be: a delivered price already includes the driver, and adding his hours separately would count them twice.

The reasoning behind each figure

Written out so a batching plant can point at the exact assumption that is wrong.

Ready-mix concreteestimated, ±22%

• The list price per cubic yard, scaled by mix strength: 0.94 at 2,500 psi, 1 at 3,000, 1.06 at 4,000 and 1.13 at 4,500 or above. Those steps are our estimate of what a plant charges between grades.
• The band is the spread across the country. Cement and aggregate are heavy, so a delivered price is mostly local haulage: the same mix costs meaningfully different money near a plant and an hour away from one.
• ⚠️ This is a DELIVERED price and the driver’s time is already inside it, which is why there is no separate labour line on this page. It is also why your area moves this figure less than any other calculator on this site: a delivered yard is material and haulage rather than somebody’s hourly rate, and the haulage is already in the band.
• This line is list price only. What most people are actually surprised by is the two lines below it.

Short-load surchargeestimated, ±42%

• ⚠️ The line this page exists for. A mixer truck, its driver and its round trip cost the plant the same whether it carries three yards or ten, so below about 5 yards they charge for the yards that are missing. Quantity here is exactly that shortfall.
• It is why "how much does a yard of concrete cost" has no single answer. The yard in an eight-yard order and the yard in a two-yard order are not the same product commercially, and the difference is not small.
• The practical consequence is worth knowing before ordering: if you are close to the minimum, adding a path or a pad you were going to do next year can cost almost nothing, because you are already paying for the yards.

Delivery and fuelestimated, ±49%

• A per-load delivery charge that most plants apply on top of the yardage, however much is on the truck.
• A load is up to about ten yards, so an order past that is two loads and two delivery charges — and, worth planning for, two trucks that have to arrive close enough together that the first pour has not set before the second starts.

Mileage beyond the free radiusestimated, ±50%

• Most plants include the first ten miles or so and charge per mile beyond it, each way. Quantity here is the miles over that radius.
• It is also a reason to ask which plant is quoting: the nearest one is not always the cheapest per yard, but it is often the cheapest delivered, and the delivered figure is the only one that matters.

Standby time on siteestimated, ±33%

• The price includes an unloading window of roughly 7 minutes per yard. Past that the truck bills by the minute, because it is a truck that cannot be somewhere else.
• This is the most avoidable charge on the page and the one people are angriest about. It is avoided by having the forms finished, the reinforcement tied and enough people standing there before the truck arrives, not while it waits.
• It also has a hard limit that money cannot fix: concrete in a drum has a working life of about ninety minutes from batching, and a driver will leave rather than let it go off in the truck.

Cold-weather acceleratorestimated, ±50%

• An admixture that speeds the set so a cold-weather pour reaches strength before it can freeze. Priced per yard, which is how plants sell it.
• It is not antifreeze and it does not make a pour below freezing safe on its own: the slab still has to be protected with blankets afterwards, and that is not a plant charge.

Fibre reinforcement in the mixestimated, ±39%

• Polypropylene fibre batched into the load. It controls the fine cracking that happens while concrete is still plastic, which is a real and useful thing.
• What it does not do is replace mesh or rebar. Fibre works on the surface in the first hours; steel works across a crack for thirty years, and a plant selling fibre as a substitute is selling the wrong thing.

Saturday or out-of-hours deliveryestimated, ±49%

• Plants batch on a weekday schedule, so a Saturday load means opening the plant and paying a driver overtime. It is charged per load.
• For a homeowner doing the work themselves this is often unavoidable, and it is worth pricing into the decision rather than discovering on the invoice.

Environmental and washout feeestimated, ±50%

• A small per-load charge that covers washing out the drum and disposing of the slurry, which is strongly alkaline and cannot simply be tipped on the ground or into a drain.
• If you are pouring yourself, ask where the truck is allowed to wash out before it arrives. It is a conversation that goes much worse afterwards.

Line pump, fee and hoursestimated, ±39%

• A separate contractor from the concrete plant: a call-out fee plus a minimum number of hours with an operator.
• It looks expensive and it usually is not, because what it replaces is several people running wheelbarrows against a ninety-minute clock. If the truck cannot reach the pour, this is the line that decides whether the pour goes well.

Not included in this dataset

What a finished slab costs

This page prices concrete delivered to your kerb and nothing else. A poured, reinforced, finished slab costs substantially more, because the concrete is only part of it — the rest is excavation, base, forms, steel, placing, finishing and curing. Our concrete slab page prices that job, and the split between the two is deliberate: they are different purchases.

Anybody to place it

The driver brings the truck and runs the chute. Getting the concrete from the chute into the forms, screeding it, floating it and finishing it is not part of a delivery, and on a job of any size it is more work than most people expect against a clock that does not stop.

Mixing it yourself

Bagged concrete is genuinely cheaper for very small quantities — a few post holes, a small pad. It stops being cheaper somewhere around half a yard, which is roughly forty 80-pound bags, and it stops being sensible well before it stops being cheaper, because every bag is mixed separately and a slab poured in batches is a slab with cold joints through it.

Cutting or grinding the concrete afterwards

Saw-cutting joints, grinding a surface or breaking anything out is respirable crystalline silica work under OSHA 29 CFR 1926.1153, with a written exposure control plan and engineering controls such as water-fed tools. It is not a delivery cost and it is not a trivial one.

Local plant minimums and policies

The minimum load, the free mileage radius, the unloading window and the washout policy all vary by plant. The figures here are a model of the usual shape of those charges, not a quote from any particular supplier, and the way to get a real number is to ask two plants for a delivered price for your exact yardage.

On cutting the joints afterwards: OSHA 1926.1153, Respirable crystalline silica covers respirable crystalline silica in construction, with a permissible exposure limit and a required written exposure control plan. Retrieved 2026-08-22.