How to choose the right dining table size for your room

It is one of those quietly miserable little ironies of furniture buying — you can spend weeks deciding on a table, find one you adore, have it delivered, and then realise within a fortnight that something about it isn't quite right. Often it is the size. The proportions feel slightly off, the chairs catch as you push them back, the room either gapes or crowds, and what should feel like the calm, anchoring centre of the home instead feels like a small ongoing irritation.

The honest answer to what size dining table should I buy is that there is no honest answer in the abstract — only in your specific room. But there are some sensible principles. We tend to leave a minimum of 90cm of clear space all the way round the table, measured from the edge to the nearest wall, radiator, sideboard or skirting. A little more if the chairs are particularly large, or if anyone needs to walk behind a seated guest while plates are being served. Less than that and the room never quite settles.

Length is the easier dimension. Allow about 60cm of width per person if you want everyone to eat without bumping elbows — 70cm if you'd like a bit of breathing room and somewhere to set a glass down. The width of the table itself is more often where people miscalculate. Anything narrower than 90cm and there isn't quite enough room down the middle for serving dishes and candlesticks once the plates are in front of everyone. Anything wider than around 110cm starts to make conversation a small feat of projection.

The thing very few people consider is the bit underneath the table. Pedestal bases, splay legs, wide aprons and long stretchers all eat into legroom in ways you will not notice on a website but will notice on the third evening, when a knee has caught on the same stretcher for the third time. (We've written separately on why pedestals, stretchers and aprons get in everyone's way.)

If your room is in any way unusual — and most older houses are — none of the standard sizes you'll find online will land quite right. We've written more about why standard sizes don't work in period homes, and about the real reason your table doesn't fit your room, if either of those happen to be the conversation you're having with yourself.

If you'd like a hand working out what would actually suit, do get in touch. We make every table to size.