Storage Ottoman: Measure Your Sofa Before You Buy One
A storage ottoman in front of the sofa is doing a coffee table’s job, so the figure that decides it is not its own. It is your sofa.
Bob Vila gives the rule of thumb in one line: the tabletop should sit one to two inches lower than the seat cushion height. Measure your sofa cushion first, subtract one or two, and you have the height to shop for, whatever it comes to.
- 1 to 2 inHow much lower than your cushion the top should sit, says Bob Vila
- 17 to 19 inWhat the same page calls a typical sofa seat cushion height
- 16 to 18 inThe coffee table height that page recommends, floor to tabletop
- 19.5 inThe seat height on the one ottoman listing I read, above the typical range
I read the Crawford and Burke Berkley storage ottoman listing on Home Depot in full. It publishes the seat height and nothing else that is measurable. No specification table. No weight capacity. No product weight. No width or depth. Nothing about the lid, and nothing about the hinges.
That matters for a piece of furniture people sit on, put their feet on, and open. If the listing you are reading is the same, these are the questions to put to the seller, in writing, before you order. Does the lid lift off or hinge, and does a hinged lid have a support that holds it open? What is the ottoman rated to carry, given that people sit on these?
Until you have an answer, treat it as a lid that falls shut: keep children from opening it, and keep your hand out of the box while you are holding the lid up.
Your sofa decides this, not the ottoman. Page 3 of the free Small Space Fit Planner is the height of your own seat cushion, taken at the front edge with nobody sitting on it. That is the figure to hold the listing against. Five printable pages. Get the free planner
📏 Work out the height to shop for, from your own sofa Your cushion height goes in, the band the rule of thumb asks for comes out, and the listing gets held against it. Try it ↓Storage ottoman height: the band your own sofa sets
1 to 2 in
Bob Vila says a coffee table should measure 16 to 18 inches from the floor to the tabletop, and adds the rule of thumb: one to two inches lower than the seat cushion. The same page puts a typical seat cushion height at 17 to 19 inches, and notes that coffee tables range from 12 to 24 inches tall. That range is what the market sells. It is not what the page recommends.
Take the sofa measurement first
Step 1
Sit on your sofa, then get up
Put the tape on the floor and run it to the top of the seat cushion, with the seat empty. A cushion you are sitting on gives you the wrong number.
Step 2
That is your seat cushion height
It is the number the rest of this depends on. Bob Vila puts a typical seat cushion height at 17 to 19 inches. Measure yours rather than assume it.
Step 3
Subtract one or two, and shop for that
Take your own cushion figure, subtract one or two, and shop for that height, whatever it comes to. That band, not a number off a list, is your target.
Does this ottoman fit your sofa? Put your cushion height into the tool further down and it gives you the band to shop for, then holds the height on your listing against it. Try it
Now read the storage ottoman listingthe one that sent me looking, and what 19.5 in means
Here is what sent me looking.
The Crawford and Burke Berkley storage ottoman publishes a seat height of 19.5 in, in a feature bullet on its Home Depot listing. That is the ottoman’s own height, not a sofa figure.
Hold it against the rule of thumb. Bob Vila calls 17 to 19 inches a typical sofa seat cushion height, and 19.5 in sits above the top of that range. The rule of thumb asks for a top below the cushion, not above it.
So measure your own cushion before you decide on this one. It can still work as a footrest and as a box. As the thing you put a tray on in front of a typical sofa, it is tall.
None of that makes it a bad ottoman. It makes it an ottoman to measure against your own sofa before you order.
Our guide to a mudroom bench with storage runs the same check on a bench, where neither of the two listings I read put a seat height in its specification table.
Four things to check besides the heightthe lid, the load, the inside, and the floor around it
The lid. Ask whether the lid lifts off or hinges, and whether a hinged lid has a support that holds it open. If the seller will not say, treat it as a lid that falls shut: keep children from opening it, and keep your hand out of the box while you are holding the lid up.
What it is rated to carry. People sit on these. If the listing publishes no figure, ask for one in writing.
The inside, not the outside. A deep lid and thick upholstery eat the box. Ask for the inside dimensions rather than reading the outside ones.
The floor around it. An ottoman in front of a sofa needs a path. Our mudroom storage solutions guide has the tape test for deciding what a walkway can give up, and it works in a living room too.
What I could not verifytwo things, said plainly
Two things, said plainly.
What I have for the height is a recommendation for coffee tables, published by Bob Vila, and I have used it as that. The page calls it a rule of thumb itself.
And the 19.5 in figure comes from 1 product listing read in full. On that one, the seat height was the only measurable figure published. I am not telling you the rest of the market publishes nothing. I am telling you what I found on the one I read.
Frequently asked questionshow tall, as a coffee table, and if yours is already too tall
How tall should a storage ottoman be?
Measure your sofa seat cushion from the floor to its top, then take one to two inches off. That is Bob Vila’s rule of thumb, and it gives you a target rather than a guess. The same page puts a typical sofa seat cushion at 17 to 19 inches and a coffee table at 16 to 18 inches, both measured from the floor.
Can I use a storage ottoman as a coffee table?
It is a common use for them, and it is a question of height. Bob Vila’s rule of thumb puts the top one to two inches lower than the seat cushion height, so measure your sofa cushion and shop against that. Too tall and you reach up to put a glass down. Put a tray on it if the top is soft, and take the tray off before you open the lid.
My ottoman is taller than my sofa cushion. Is that a problem?
Not for a footrest, and not for storage. For a surface in front of the sofa, it is the other way around from Bob Vila’s rule of thumb, which puts the top one to two inches below the cushion. If you already own it, a tray makes it a better surface. It does not make it shorter. Take the tray off before you open the lid.
Does this ottoman fit your sofa?
Two numbers, and you get the height to shop for.
Floor to the top of the cushion, at the front edge, with nobody sitting on it.
Leave this empty if the listing does not publish a height. You will still get your target.
The one-to-two-inches-lower rule, the 17 to 19 inch typical cushion figure and the 16 to 18 inch coffee table figure are Bob Vila’s, on the coffee table height page we read in full for this article. The page calls the rule a rule of thumb itself. The second box is whatever the listing in front of you prints, not a figure of ours. Nothing you type leaves your browser.
Taking the tape around the living room?
The Small Space Fit Planner gives you a box for the cushion height, the walking space you have to leave, and the length of the sofa. Fill it in before you open a listing.
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