Murphy Desk Wall Depth Calculator

This is a Murphy desk. A Murphy desk gets put in when you want to get the floor back. But installing them isn’t always easy. Frequently the final product jut 8″ or more from the wall, not to mention a folding panel that slams your knee because of the barrel hinges.

That’s what derails most of these projects; there’s a gap between expectation and reality, but this time it’s typically a math problem different than a woodworking one. Getting the desk to function require you to think in three dimensions at the same time.

How to Measure for Your Desk

First off, do you want the desk to blend in with room or block out the room? The answer depends on the space between the walls, also called the closed profile. This will determine if the depth of the desk are acceptable. Four inches from a thin laptop panel is no problem. Twelve or fourteen inches from a full secretary desk with storage is another matter entirely. It all comes down to how much shoulder room you’re willing to sacrifice by having that additional width in the hall.

Any handles, front trim, mounting cleat, and back panel. Those little things adds up fast and need to be measured. Clearance around chairs are especially important in the open position. For a traditional desk, you need at least twenty-eight inches of depth for your keyboard and arms, plus however much distance you’ll want from your backside to the wall. If you’re using a rolling chair, be sure to factor that extra twenty-four to thirty inches for comfortabley sliding beneath. And make sure to allow for three feet behind your backside as an aisle; after all, who wants to climb over their gear every time they exit the room?

This sort of real-world understanding will help you believe what the calculator’s spitting out. But it handles all this stacking logic for you. Remember: monitors is wide too! Monitor arms and power bricks are a great way to kill the slim aesthetic of any design, and forgetting they exist can lead to cables destroying your space. Forgetting to leave a bit of space behind desktop means propping your laptop on books while plugging it in; don’t do this! Leave yourself half-inch of cable slack; this minor sacrifice will pay off when you grab a charging cable. It’s an easy-to-forget step but one that’ll make your setup more usable over time.

The other limitation that trips people up is wall width; there simply isn’t enough room for the hinge mechanism to swing free from the door frame or baseboard. If your available wall space is tight, then maybe you has to cut down on the desktop width or switch to a different mount. These are the decisions where the tool’s reference tables comes into play, they illustrate the difference between a hallway configuration vs. A bedroom workstation, which dictates those design decisions. Dedicated nooks offer more comfort, while narrow passageways has less depth but allow for greater speed.

A few things to keep in mind when planning for a fold-down desk: you can’t have zero wall projection, infinite storage, and maximum chair clearance all at once. So choose two of these priorities. Do you want something really deep? Accept that the cabinet will stick out further when it’s closed up. Want it flush to the wall? Go with a thin panel, and stash your cables somewhere else.

That way, you’re not realizing “oh I wish I should of had X” after drilling holes in drywall, and can see the tradeoffs before you commit, just think through what matters most in your particular space and let the tool help you visualize. Then the desk won’t get in the way at all.