2 free starting plans
Carport plans
2 free pole carport plans, 20x20 and 24x24: open on all four sides, a knee brace at every post and a steel roof on trusses, drawn and priced by the barn designer.
- Plans
- 2
- Floor, sq ft
- 400 to 576
- Materials, about
- $3,200 to $4,300
- Preliminary checks
- All passed at 30 psf
Every size, drawn by the designer
Pick a carport size.
Each one is a full starting plan: framed, checked for 30 psf of ground snow, 115 mph of wind and a 36 in frost line, and priced. Switch the view to see the frame or the dimensions.
Drawn by the designer from this plan20x20
20x20 carport
One car or a small truck under a steel roof, on two 10 ft bays.
- Floor
- 400 sq ft
- Eave
- 9'
- Sides
- Open, braced
- Posts
- 6, 3-ply 2x6
- Trusses
- 3 at 10', 20' span
- Bays
- 2 of 10'
Preliminary checks passed for the loads you entered. Local approval not checked.
Materials about $3,200, before tax and delivery
What it needs
What an open carport needs.
No walls means the posts and braces do the work. Here is what that changes on each plan.
01Open sides
Knee braces stand in for the walls.
With no walls to brace it, every post gets a 2x6 knee brace at 45 degrees up to the truss, 18 in down the post at this 9' eave. Posts on an open side also go 24 in deeper than on a closed wall: 6' in the ground on concrete pads, where a closed building at the same frost line uses 4'.
02Clear height
9' under the eave.
The designer looks for 8' of clear height for a car or a pickup and flags anything lower; an RV needs about 14 ft. Both plans here have a 9' eave. Measure your tallest vehicle with whatever rides on its roof before you settle on the eave.
04Floor and permit
Drawn on gravel.
As drawn, the carport sits on a gravel pad, priced from published ranges; the designer can switch it to a concrete slab. Whether a carport needs a permit, and how close it can sit to the property line, depends on your town: check with your building department before you dig.
Side by side
Both carport plans compared.
| Plan | Floor | Eave | Clear height | Posts | Trusses | Materials, about | Labor if hired, broad reference | Build time | Checks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20x2020x20 carport | 400 sq ft | 9' | 9' clear, open sides | 6 | 3 at 10' | $3,200 | $2,000 to $6,000 | 40 to 60 h | Passed |
 24x2424x24 carport | 576 sq ft | 9' | 9' clear, open sides | 8 | 4 at 8' | $4,300 | $2,880 to $8,640 | 50 to 75 h | Passed |
Each row is the starting plan as drawn, for 30 psf of ground snow, 115 mph of wind and a 36 in frost line. Materials are rounded: shelf prices plus the estimated trusses and concrete, before sales tax, delivery, labor and site work. Each plan page keeps the shelf prices, the estimate and the exact sum apart. Labor is the published range for hiring it out, a broad reference and not a quote; build time is total labor hours. Passed means the preliminary checks passed for those loads; local approval is not checked.
What they cost
About $3,200 to $4,300 in materials.
Each plan's materials list, priced line by line: shelf prices plus the trusses, the post concrete and the gravel estimated from published ranges. Hired labor is apart and only a broad reference from published price guides, not a quote; the table above has it plan by plan.
- Lowest
- $3,200, 20x20
- Highest
- $4,300, 24x24
- Per sq ft of floor
- $7.46 to $8.09
- Labor if hired, broad reference
- $2,000 to $8,640
Excluded: sales tax, delivery, permits, site work, engineering and equipment rental
The pole barn cost guide breaks it down by group, and the pole barn cost calculator runs the same numbers for your own size.
Materials for each carport plan
Shelf prices read at Home Depot, Hamilton Mill store, Oct 8, 2026; Summertown Metals price list, Summertown, Tennessee store, Oct 13, 2026; Lowe's, Atlanta-Edgewood store, Oct 8, 2026; Best Buy Metals online store, Knoxville, Tennessee, Oct 13, 2026; Home Depot, Hamilton Mill store, Oct 13, 2026; and Home Depot, Bronx Terminal store, Sep 30, 2026, before tax and delivery. Estimates are the middle of the published ranges in HomeGuide, roof truss prices by span (Jan 2026) and HomeGuide, crushed stone and gravel prices (Dec 2025), read Oct 13, 2026.
Each total is the shelf-price lines plus the common trusses and crushed stone floor, estimated from published ranges and kept apart on each plan page. Your supplier quotes the final price for those.
Labor if you hire it out, 20x20: Median of the published figures $3,000 for 400 sq ft at $5 to $15 per sq ft (HomeGuide, Jan 2026: $5 to $10; Angi, May 2026: $5 to $15). A sourced range for erecting a post-frame shell (posts, trusses, steel), not a quote. A broad reference from published price guides, not a quote or a forecast for your site.
The $39 builder's plan
Free to plan. $39 to build from.
Every plan above is free to open, check and price. The builder's plan is drawn from the barn you finish, for one payment. These are real sheets from the 23-sheet plan for the 30x40 pole barn.
Free
- The design in 3D, and every change you make to it
- Every preliminary check, with its rule and its source
- The materials list priced line by line
- A summary PDF of the design and its checks
$39 once
- The post layout, every post dimensioned from one corner
- Every wall framed: girts, headers and openings with heights
- The truss order sheet to hand the truss maker
- The roof frame and the steel, panel by panel
- The cut list, the shopping list with store prices and the build, step by step
You check out in the designer, with your design loaded. If the plan has an error, we fix it or refund you within 30 days. Guarantee terms.
Real sheets from the 23-sheet sample plan for the 30x40 pole barn
01Post layout
02Wall framing
05Truss order sheet
04Shopping list
Questions
Anything else? Write to us or read the questions about all plans.
Questions about carport plans
The materials for our 20x20 pole carport come to about $3,200, before sales tax, delivery, labor and site work: treated wood posts, trusses, purlins, knee braces and a steel roof, $2,477.36 at shelf prices plus $757.50 estimated from published ranges, exact sum $3,234.86. Hired labor adds $2,000 to $6,000, a broad reference from published price guides, not a quote.
Building it yourself saves the labor. On our 20x20 carport the published price guides we read put hired labor at $2,000 to $6,000, a broad reference rather than a quote, on top of about $3,200 in materials; built yourself, it is about 40 to 60 labor hours. We do not price kits, so we cannot compare with one.
It depends on where you build. Your town or county sets whether a carport needs a permit, how close it can sit to the property line and what it inspects. Check with your building department before you dig. Our plans run preliminary checks for the loads you enter; local approval is not checked.
On our carport plans, 6' at a 36 in frost line: at least the depth a closed building needs, below the frost line, plus 24 in because every side is open. Each post stands on a concrete pad 18 in across. The designer sets the depth from the frost line you enter.
Our carport plans are drawn for 115 mph, with a knee brace at every post and the posts set 24 in deeper on the open sides. You can enter up to 140 mph in the designer; past 115 mph it asks for a second look at the posts, bracing and uplift, and at 140 mph it needs an engineered design. These are preliminary checks; local approval is not checked.
Other ways to browse
Not quite the barn you picture?
Your loads, your barn
Start from the 20x20. Make it yours.
Change the width, the length, the bays, the eave, the doors and your loads. The post size and depth, the purlins, the headers and the materials list follow every change. Free, no account.
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- $39 once
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