Not sure that there is a "best size" but I do know that most garages on builder's plans, in spec houses, and on the plans available online are way tooooo small. Typically I think they're often just 20x20. Not sure a full sized SUV would even fit in one.

At a bare minimum, you need at least two feet of clear space in front and behind the longest vehicle you ever plan to drive so measure or look up that length and add 4 ft then go up from there. Obviously, if you drive an SUV or extended cab pickup with a full bed, you're going to need a longer garage than if you drive a Ford Fiesta.

Widthwise, at a BARE minimum, you need two feet between the two cars and two feet on each side. Because all vehicles have to drive in the same lanes, car widths don't tend to vary nearly as much as lengths. Still, there is some variation so again, it depends on the width of the cars you drive.

Then, if you plan to add any storage shelves at the front or sides of your cars, add additional length/width for that. And, if you think you or someone in your family might ever be wheelchair bound, it makes sense to make the garage a bit wider to accommodate the chair.

The two-bay section of our garage is 25ft wide by 23ft deep and I figured that would be plenty big enough because we have a third garage bay that was supposed to be for all the stuff that winds up getting stored in the garage and because DH and I always choose to drive smaller cars or a small pickup - currently a Toyota Tacoma. (We don't even like it when we rent a compact car and the rental agent insists on giving us a free upgrade to a midsize because they don't have any compacts in stock!)

Well, if I had it to do over again, I'd make the garage another foot or another two deeper. It is plenty wide enough but DH decided (over my LOUD protests) to put some 18 inch deep metal shelves all along the front wall for storage so that he could have more space in the third bay for "woodworking." Now we have to pull our Toyota Tacoma pickup almost right up against the metal shelving to have room enough to walk around the back bumper when the garage door is closed. Grrr.

Well, at least we CAN still get both vehicles into the garage and get in and out of them without getting car-grime all over our clothing. LOL!

I think 16' and 18' are pretty much standard double garage door widths and I'd definitely go with the 18' wide. (We got 8' wide single doors and while they are plenty wide enough, I think a single 16ft wide door would force you to park your two vehicles too close together for comfort.

Hope this helps.

Our current garage is 24' deep (plenty for our Honda Odyssey and Jeep Wrangler Unlimited plus a workbench). However, it is only 19 foot wide. We both have to squeeze out of our vehicles. Our new house garage will be 23 1/2' wide with no stuff stored in it!

Sounds like 25x25 is a winner! (And, if possible, I'd choose 2 individual single doors rather than a double-wide door).

Ours is roomy at 29'wide x25'deep. Ours is a 2-car, 18' single door with a 36" 'man door' to the left of the garage door + extra space for refrigerator, bikes, etc on the left side of the garage as well as at the top of the garage (in front of the parked cars). There is approx 2' behind the man door that allows for our spare refrigerator and dog supplies to go on that wall. The walkway is approx 5' wide from the edge of the garage door to the far side of the man door (not including refrigerator & dog supply storage area). The car and walkway into the house dimensions are 26'8"wide x 25'deep.

If you spec an 8' tall door, you can find some 20' wide single garage doors out there. You need to spec that while i the design phase--once they've got the walls up, its too late.

We opted for one large door (18')even though we liked the look of 2 single doors better--1) DH was VERY worried I'd take out the skinny little 1-2' wide brick wall portion that separates the 2 single garage doors with the back of the car causing untold damage to the house and car & 2) cost--2 doors & 2 openers were more expensive than 1 large door and 1 opener.

Hope this helps!

Ours garages are as follows:

2 car bay - 21'-2 1/2" (wide) x 19'-11" (deep)
1 car bay - 11'-8 1/2" (wide) x 19'-4" (deep)

I really wish I would have made them wider now! 25 feet wide sounds great.

Here is a link that might be useful: Our home sell/build blog

I thought architect was crazy insisting on a 24x24 garage, but I have to admit it is very useful....room enough for shelving and trash and wood storage (for our wood stove) plus room in the middle to roll the gas grill and/or snow blower in and out and still be able to walk around and in and out of the cars comfortably.

I would prefer 24' d x 26' w with two 10' w x 8' h doors.
Casey

We're planning on a 24x24, after having looked at lots of different garages. This is enough for two big vehicles and space to liberally put items around the perimeter, plus a work bench. With an 18' garage door, 22'-24' wide is about as spacious even big vehicles can use, unless you want to put each vehicle at a sharp angle to the other every time you pull in. Anything more than that is just storage.

kirkhall--why 2 individual doors? This always seemed silly to me.

24'x30' and 10' tall will give you plenty of room for even an SUV and a workbench if you go with the 8' tall garage door and the high lift kit which gets the tracks up out of the way so a tall vehicle can enter. The extra 6' is really really useful and can house a doggie wash station, or extra freezer, or the family bicycles or the weekend motorcycle or jet ski. I've NEVER EVER seen anyone complain that a garage was "too large".

I vote for 3 garage doors. 2 for the cars to pull into, and one to the backyard. I can't count the times we have built/worked on something in the garage and had to move it through the regular doors to go into the backyard through the side gate. If only we had a garage door that opened into the backyard, we could have just pushed/driven the following from the garage right into the yard:

Generator (with the wheels it's wide enough the door has to come off the hinges)
Lawn mower
Garden tractor
snow blower
wheelbarrow
garden cart
oversized plastic shed/thing to house generator

If you don't plan to fence the yard then maybe it won't be as much of a PITA for you ... but it would even be good for a nice cross breeze when you're in the garage working on something.

CamG - why 2 individual doors? This always seemed silly to me.

For me, truthfully the major reason I went with two individual garage doors is because I just prefer that look...especially with doors made to mimic the look of old carriage house doors.

But, on the practical side tho, two doors are individually lighter than a double door so if both garage door openers should happen to go out (or the electricity is out) so that I have to open them manually, its a bit easier to do. If one garage door opener malfunctions, I can still get the other car in/out using the other door.

Finally, when I was a teenager and just learning to drive we lived for awhile in a house that had a double garage door. At night, I was always a bit afraid that someone could slip into the garage at edge farthest from me while I was pulling in. Dad had taught me to always wait until the garage door was down before getting out of the car just in case someone was lurking in the bushes somewhere. But then I realized that with a car parked on the other side of the garage, it was impossible to see that far edge as I waited for the garage door to close. It occurred to me that an intruder COULD wait in the shadows near the house for me to pull in and then then, If they stayed down low so that the other car blocked my view of then, they could slip into the garage with me. With a single door, the opening is narrow enough that it would be a lot harder for someone to slip in without the driver seeing them. Mind you, I admit I've never actually heard of an intruder getting in in this way but once I had it in my imagination....

I agree with bevangel about the look of the 2 doors.

Not to feed your paranoia, but there has been a robber in the area who has been following elderly women home from the grocery store and robbing them at gunpoint in their garage....

Here is a link that might be useful: Robberies

Thanks everyone!

Currently our plan shows a garage is 22' wide and 24' deep so this has been really good feedback.

We do have a seperate single car garage that will mainly be used for a workshop and storage, so storage in the garage isn't a HUGE concern, but overtime everything seems to end up there!

Cool.. I thought our 2 car garage at 33 wide and 29 deep would be too small. I deeply regret not getting the three car garage design. I would have allowed room for a boat or jet skis... I might get them in where we are at now..

:) We do have a third garage, so I may just be acting a bit spoiled!

We have a 5000 square foot limit for finished and unfinished space (inc. garage) due to local permitting rules so I may not be able to expand my two car garage any further... I'd like to make it 26 wide and 26 deep...

Just a comment on two doors vs one - our garage door spring broke in the morning once and we were stuck with both cars trapped in the garage until it could be repaired late in the afternoon.

If that scenario is one that you can't ever afford to be in, then you might want to go with 2 doors.

Perfect two car garage size ... 25 x 50 !! ... 25 x 25 for the cars and 25 x 25 for the junk that invariably seems to accumulate in the garage.

size matters here.
i'd go 16x16 for each vehicle, and another 16x16 for lawn or other equipment.

ahh... 16x16 for each vehicle... I wish I could manage that!

Our detached garage is 26'W x 28'D with two 8'x7' overhead doors. With mid-sized cars, we have plenty of room at the back of the garage for gardening stuff and room on the side for bicycles. The one thing I wish we would have done is 9' wide doors instead of 8' wide. With a pull-down stair and split-web trusses, we have lots of seasonal storage above, too. We would have preferred a permanent wider stair, but did the pull-down to save money.

Here is a link that might be useful: Garage is complete

If you're having it built or building it yourself consider a size that creates less construction waist, more simplified framing and has readily available engineered plans.

Andrew Murray, this is a 5 year old post..................

Haha Peter. Me too! We decided our garage plan should be 28'x28' then our planner grew it to 30'30' and I had to talk DH back down to 28'x28' (outside measurements). I would like to talk him down to 26'x26' or 26'Dx28'W to cut costs. I really don't think DH will store his truck in there. What did you decide?

Perfect size for a 2-car garage? Well I guess it depends on whether you intend to park your cars, trucks or suvs in the garage...or in the driveway...!

A 12 ft high ceiling if you ever consider installing a car lift.

A seven year old thread...?

I'm gonna guess the perfect size for a garage is the size that will allow parking of the owner's vehicles, plus all the accumulated junk the family has assembled for the last 20 years...

100 X 100 should do nicely...

If you have room 23' x 23' is a good size, you can use 2- 9' wide garage doors and still have room on the sides and the back for storage, etc.

I would always start at 24 X 24. 2'-9" doors may be a tad small for most cars and pick-em up trucks, but probably workable for 90 percent of the population.

@Virgil you can fit any car into a 9' garage door. I had a Hummer parked in my garage with 9' doors and the width of that truck was almost 90", and it was plenty of room making a turn into a side entrance garage.

Sorry--my mistake! I thought you wrote 2'-9", when you actually wrote two 9' doors!

Hate it when my dyslexia acts up...

No problem, it happens to the best of us. As 2'9" opening goes, I doubt this toy would fit in it :-)

You have to decide what you will be storing in the garage... Over flow "stuff" from the house? Do you have a hobby that needs space - woodworking, mechanics, gardening? Do you live in a place where the "mudroom" is in the garage or is it part of the house? Do you store "toys" - for instance keeping a boat in the garage mean you need a taller garage door, so it could fit inside with the tower up, as well being a longer bay to accommodate the trailer length. Or if you live in snow country and have a sled deck on a pick up and want to be able to pull into the garage with sleds on top - again taller door and wider bay. As has been said - the garage can never be too big. :) Also - the width you want may be impacted by the size of the vehicle doors. Generally two door car have longer doors and so swing open wider, while a van with sliding doors doesn't have the same "footprint". Measure what you currently use, and consider what you would like to have to make sure your space is not just a couple feet too tight for your dreams.

Hi I need some advice we are building a house and we only have space to put in a garage size of 28 length x 16 wide is that big enough to be considered a two car garage?

HU-375374400, it would be better if you started a new post. More people will see your question and answer. IMO it would be considered a two car garage in name only. The size of a normal 2- car garage door is 16 ft wide, you would have to have a smaller door because you only have 16 ft in your building garage width. 28 ft deep is excellent. It's the width that is hurting you.

The alternate is you could potentially park the vehicles in tandam - if you have short/small vehicles like a smart car or motorcycles.

28 x 16 is a generous one car garage

Rooms should be designed around the furniture that goes in them. The same goes for garages, but the furniture is cars AND TRUCKS. Almost everybody drives a pick-up truck or truck-based SUV now. If you don't drive one of these monstrosities, when it's time to sell a lot of potential buyers of your home will.

A Silverado or Suburban is 81" wide, not counting mirrors. They can be 20 feet long. You'd want three feet at each end and close to four feet between them and between them and the side wall of the garage. You need to add space for whatever you have stacked against the side and rear walls, tool. Allow roughly four feet (48") between the cars/trucks to open the car/truck doors.

Forget about double garage doors. Each bay should have its own door, preferably nine or ten feet wide, and eight feet tall (to prevent SUV tailgates from whacking the open garage door (above). That means the ceiling should be ten feet high.

You need table area in a garage. Craftsman work benches (72 inches x 24 inches) work well and aren't too deep.

Few architects and spec' builders get the garage door spacing right, so here are some diagrams:

For a three-car, 36 feet is the magic number for width, with 21 inches between the 9-foot-wide doors and 33 inches from the doors to the interior of the side walls (or foundation if it's high enough to be hit by car doors).

For a two-car, 25 feet is the magic number for width, with 20 inches between the nine-foot-wide doors and 32 inches from the doors to the interior of the side walls (or foundation if it's high enough to be hit by car doors).

The garage is really the main entrance to the house. Keeping it uncluttered has aesthetic value. So, separate tool rooms for the normal garage clutter can transform the garage. One tool room should open to the backyard (for yard stuff) and one open to the inside of the garage (for car stuff).

I did not know "Almost everybody drives a pick-up truck or truck-based SUV now."

I wonder if that was true 14 years ago when this thread started?

I guess you dn't live in Bubbaville llike I do. It seems like every old geezer in my 'hood, Bubba Estates, has a full-size, four-door, 4WD pick-up truck. They put covers over the bed, turning them into giant sedans. The families on both sides of me have/had them, as do/did the families on the other sides of them. There's currently a Suburban in my two-doors-down neighbor's driveway. It belongs to a guest.

The two garages in your portfolio are close, but no cigar. I'm sure there was room on the lots to make those garages 25 feet wide.

People don't drive to their weekend lake house in their Porsche 911. Years ago, GM did a study to determine which of their vehicles were purchased most by their wealthiest customers. Corvette? Nope! Cadillac? Nope! The answer was a Chevy Suburban (or the GMC clone that was also called a Suburban at the time). GM's next question was why? The answer was to tow a boat, horse trailer, sail plane (glider) on a trailer, and to pack the whole family and stuff for the trip to the weekend house. This study is what caused GM to make a Cadillac version of the Suburban (the Escalade).

Guess which model of BMW is their sales leader in the US. Hint: It's 78.9 inches wide, excluding mirrors (which fold). That's only 2.1 inches narrower than a Suburban.