Picture Frame Cut List Calculator
Every frame rail is a 45° miter, and the length that matters is the long point. Enter the art size and your moulding, and get all four rail lengths, the outside frame size, the glass size, and how much moulding to buy.
The visible width of the frame stock, rabbet edge to outer edge. Sets how far each miter grows the outside.
Advanced: allowance, rabbet lip & waste
Extra added to the art size so glass and art drop into the rabbet. ⅛″ total is typical.
How far the frame covers the art edge. Sets the visible (sight) opening.
How the cut list is built
The rabbet opening is the artwork plus the fit allowance. Each rail's long-point length is rabbet opening + 2 × moulding width; the short-point (rabbet) length equals the rabbet opening. The outside frame is the two long-point lengths, and glass is cut to the rabbet opening.
The sight opening — what you actually see — is the artwork minus twice the rabbet lip, because the lip overlaps the art on every edge.
Worked example
An 8 × 10 photo with ⅛″ allowance and 2″ moulding: rabbet opening 8⅛ × 10⅛. Width rails 12⅛″ long point, height rails 14⅛″ long point (two each). Outside frame 12⅛ × 14⅛, glass 8⅛ × 10⅛, and you see 7½ × 9½.
Framing cleanly
Measure to the long point
Cut each rail to its long-point length — the outer, longer edge of the miter. Getting opposite rails exactly equal matters as much as the 45° angle; a stop block makes the pairs identical.
Buy a little extra moulding
Miters waste stock at every corner and a blow-out ruins a rail, so buy beyond the bare total. The waste figure here adds that margin; for figured or grain-matched moulding, lean higher.