Installed quartz runs $50–$65 per square foot for builder grade, $65–$90 for mid grade and $90–$200 for premier and designer colours, with most kitchens landing at $70–$100. Fabrication and installation labour is $10–$30 of that per square foot — so on a builder-grade top, the labour can be a third of the price.
Slab, fabrication and installation are three different costs
A countertop quote bundles three things that behave differently, and separating them explains almost every price difference between two quotes for the same kitchen.
- ·The slab. The raw material, priced by grade and colour. This is where the $50-to-$200 spread lives.
- ·Fabrication. Cutting to a template, forming the edge profile, and cutting the sink and hob openings. Priced with installation at $10–$30 per square foot in this dataset.
- ·Installation. Delivery, seaming and fixing. Largely fixed per job rather than per square foot, which is why small kitchens have a higher effective rate.
| Grade | Installed |
|---|---|
| Builder grade | $50–$65 |
| Commercial / mid grade | $65–$90 |
| Premier / designer | $90–$200 |
This page's own dataset. Most kitchens land at $70–$100 per square foot; fabrication and install labour is $10–$30 of the figure.
The consequence of the labour share is worth stating plainly: on a builder-grade top at the bottom of its band, roughly a third of what you pay is fabrication and fitting, not stone. Choosing a cheaper colour therefore saves less than the headline spread suggests, because a large part of the cost does not move with the colour at all.
The options that actually move the total
Beyond grade, the extras this calculator prices are the ones that recur on real invoices, and a few of them are larger than people expect.
- ·Edge profile. A basic eased or bevelled edge is usually included. Ogee, bullnose and mitred waterfall edges are fabrication time and are charged as such.
- ·Cutouts. Each sink, hob and tap hole is a separate operation, and an undermount sink cutout is polished on the exposed edge, which a drop-in is not.
- ·Seams. Slabs have a maximum size. A run longer than a slab needs a seam, and where that seam falls is a design decision as much as a technical one.
- ·Removal of the old top. Separate work, and tile or stone is harder to remove than laminate.
- ·An island. Often more expensive per square foot than perimeter runs, because it has four finished edges and frequently a seam.
Material prices in this category are tracked federally: the BLS producer price index for wood kitchen cabinet and countertop manufacturing stood at 288.048 in July 2026 on a June 1984 base. Only the movement within that series is meaningful — the level is not comparable with any other index, since each carries its own base year.
Why the fitting is a skilled line item
Quartz is heavy, brittle in handling and unforgiving of a bad template. A countertop is measured, cut off-site to a template of your actual cabinets, and then has one chance to fit. That is why templating is a separate visit and why a good fabricator will not template from a drawing.
The cabinet and joinery trade that this work sits alongside is large and well-paid relative to other finishing trades: the Bureau of Labor Statistics puts carpenters (SOC 47-2031) at 670,090 employed with a mean hourly wage of $31.55 and a mean annual wage of $65,630 as of May 2025, against a $65,360 mean across all construction and extraction occupations. The 10th-to-90th spread of $19.43 to $48.03 is a fair proxy for how much regional labour markets move an installed price.
A practical implication: cabinets must be installed, level and secured before templating. A schedule that tries to template early to save a week is the most common way a countertop ends up with a gap at the wall.
Where quartz sits against the alternatives
Quartz is an engineered material — crushed stone bound in resin — and its properties follow from that rather than from fashion.
- ·Against granite: quartz is non-porous, so it does not need sealing. Granite is a natural stone with natural variation, which some people want and others find unpredictable across slabs.
- ·Against laminate: several times the cost, and a different repair story — laminate damage is usually terminal, quartz chips can often be filled.
- ·Against solid surface: quartz is harder and more scratch-resistant; solid surface is repairable by sanding, which quartz is not.
- ·Its real weakness: heat. The resin binder is not heat-proof, so a hot pan sets directly on quartz can mark it permanently. This is the one property where natural stone genuinely outperforms it.
That last point is worth weighing against the price, because it is the failure mode people actually hit. Quartz asks for a trivet in exchange for never needing to be sealed — a trade most kitchens are happy with, but one worth making knowingly rather than discovering.
What the estimate excludes
- ·Plumbing disconnection and reconnection. Taps and waste have to come off and go back, and that is a plumber.
- ·Cabinet modification. Quartz is heavy; some cabinet runs need additional support, particularly under an overhang.
- ·The sink and the tap. Priced separately, and the sink must usually be on site before templating.
- ·Backsplash beyond a simple upstand. A full-height stone splash is more slab and more fabrication — see the kitchen backsplash calculator.
- ·Electrical. Relocating sockets in an upstand or island is separate.
Methodology
Installed bands by grade, the $10–$30 per square foot fabrication and installation labour figure, and the extras for edges, cutouts, seams, removal and islands are the values held in this page's own cost dataset, applied to the dimensions you enter. Wage figures are BLS OEWS May 2025; the material index is BLS PPI via FRED. Plumbing, electrical and cabinet work are not included.
Sources
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics — OEWS Profile: Carpenters (47-2031), May 2025 — accessed 2026-09-05
- U.S. BLS via FRED — PPI: Wood Kitchen Cabinet and Countertop Manufacturing (PCU337110337110) — accessed 2026-09-05