How many photos are in a shoebox? Estimating your collection
Simple rules of thumb for counting prints, albums, slides and negatives without counting a single one.
Before getting a price, most people want to know roughly how many photos they have. The good news is that you don't need to count. A few rules of thumb will get you close enough.
Loose prints: measure the stack
A standard print is roughly a quarter of a millimetre to a third of a millimetre thick. Stacked up, that works out at about 100 photos for every 2.5cm (one inch) of height. Stand your prints on edge in a box, measure the row with a ruler, and multiply.
| What you have | Roughly |
|---|---|
| A developing wallet from one film | 24 to 36 prints |
| A large envelope, well filled | around 100 |
| A small photo box | around 400 |
| A full shoebox | around 1,000 |
Prints mounted on card, Polaroids and older prints with thick borders take up more room, so a box of those will hold fewer.
Albums: count pages, not photos
Albums vary a lot, so the quickest method is to count the pages and look at a typical one. Most family albums have 20 to 40 pages, with two to six photos on each side. A typical album holds somewhere between 100 and 250 photos.
If you'd like whole pages scanned, keeping captions and handwriting together, you only need the number of page sides.
Slides
- A small yellow or grey slide box usually holds 20 to 36 slides, one film's worth.
- A round projector tray holds 80 to 140.
- A long rectangular projector magazine holds around 36 to 50.
Negatives
Negatives usually come back from the lab cut into strips of four to six frames, in a paper or plastic wallet. One wallet is normally one film: 24 or 36 pictures. Count the wallets and multiply by 24 or 36.
Why an estimate is enough
You only need a rough figure to get a price. We count everything as we scan, and you pay for what we actually digitise, not your estimate. If your collection turns out larger or smaller, the price simply follows.
Try our price calculator: tap Envelope, Box or Shoebox if you're not sure, and it will fill in a typical number for you.
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