How much does it cost to insulate an attic in 2026?

Blown fibreglass on a 1,200 square foot attic to R-49 models at about $2,600 to $3,200 installed, with the material priced at retail. Across the sizes and targets on this page, from 1,000 square feet at R-38 up to 2,000 square feet at R-60, the modelled range runs roughly $1,750 to $6,150. Two of the model's inputs, the burden multiplier and the crew hours, are estimates rather than measurements, so treat every figure as a bracket for checking quotes against, not as a price anyone owes you.

Why is the material priced at retail if contractors pay less?

Because the retail shelf price is the one figure a reader can verify today, and the trade discount has not been measured. A contractor buys the same bags below shelf price, so the material line in these tables overstates what the contractor actually pays. That bias runs one way: it makes the model conservative, which is why a real quote can come in under the low end of a table here and still be honest. When a checked supplier price exists, the model will use it and this page will change.

What R-value should I be paying for?

ENERGY STAR recommends R-30 for an uninsulated attic in climate zone 1, R-49 in zones 2 and 3, and R-60 in zones 4 through 8, which cover most of the country. An attic that already has 3 to 4 inches gets a lower target, R-49 in zones 4 through 8. Those figures are based on the 2021 IECC model code. Energy codes apply to new construction and permitted work, not usually to voluntarily adding insulation to an attic you already have. Which edition applies where you live depends on your state and often your city, and your local building department is the only authority on it.

Is there a tax credit for insulation in 2026?

The federal Section 25C credit is not available for insulation placed in service after December 31, 2025. What remains live are the state-administered Home Energy Rebates from the Inflation Reduction Act, the HOMES and HEAR programmes, and insulation and air sealing qualify under both. Availability differs by state, programmes open and close, and some have waitlists, so check with your own State Energy Office before counting any rebate in a budget. No page on this site will quote you a rebate amount, because a cached amount goes wrong within weeks.

Why do two quotes for the same attic differ so much?

Usually because they are not quoting the same job. The lines that most often differ are air sealing (frequently excluded), baffles at the eaves, removal or disposal of the old material, and the target R-value itself, which one bid may quietly set lower than the other. Ask each contractor to state the floor area, the target R-value, the bag count or coverage, and whether air sealing, baffles and disposal are in or out. Most of the spread between bids disappears once the scopes actually match.

Is it much cheaper to blow the insulation in myself?

Cheaper, but by less than it looks. Labour and its burden are about 22 percent of the model's low estimate; the rest is material, which you buy at the same retail shelf price the tables here use, while a contractor buys below it. You also take on the blowing machine, baffles, and the prep work in a hot attic. It is a genuine option for a walkable, accessible attic that needs no removal and no air sealing. For anything else, the gap between doing it yourself and hiring narrows quickly.

Attic insulation cost, installed

By Insulation Report Editorial. Last reviewed August 2026. How we research this.

A 1,200 square foot attic blown to R-49 with fibreglass runs about $2,600 to $3,200 installed, which is $2.18 to $2.66 per square foot with the material priced at retail. Those figures are built from parts, not averaged from other cost pages: the BLS May 2025 mean wage for insulation workers, a burden multiplier of 2.0 to 3.0 on that wage (an estimate), 9 to 12 crew-hours per 1,000 square feet (also an estimate), and the published price and coverage of a named bag of blown fibreglass, read in August 2026. Material is about two thirds to three quarters of the job and is priced nationally, so region moves the total far less than most cost pages claim. Check the attic before accepting any quote: if you are already within about R-10 of the ENERGY STAR level for your climate zone, air sealing usually beats more depth.

How these numbers are built

Most cost pages quote a national range and cite nothing. The figures on this page are assembled from four inputs, each with a stated basis, so you can check the arithmetic and swap in better numbers where you have them.

Input	Value	Basis
Trade wage	$26.32/hr national mean	Measured. BLS OEWS May 2025, SOC 47-2131, Insulation Workers, Floor, Ceiling and Wall
Burden multiplier	2.0 to 3.0 times wage	Estimate. The ordinary construction range, not a measurement
Crew hours	9 to 12 per 1,000 sq ft	Estimate. Secondary trade guidance for a two-person crew
Material price	$67.58 per 27.5 lb bag	Measured. Owens Corning AttiCat blown-in fibreglass, retail listing read 2026-08-07
Material coverage	110.7 / 68.5 / 39.5 / 31.8 sq ft per bag at R-19 / R-30 / R-49 / R-60	Measured. Manufacturer's published coverage, read 2026-08-07

The mechanics: crew hours scale with floor area, the wage is multiplied by the burden (the loading a contractor carries for payroll tax, workers compensation, liability insurance, the blowing machine, vehicles, overhead and profit), and the bag count comes from the manufacturer's coverage chart at the target R-value. Two of the four inputs are estimates and the tables below inherit that. They are brackets for judging quotes, not prices.

One bias is deliberate. Material is priced at the retail shelf, and a contractor buys below it. The size of that trade discount has not been measured, so rather than guess, the model charges full retail and says so. The practical effect is that the low end of every range here is conservative: a real quote can undercut it honestly.

The coverage chart also records something most calculators miss. Each bag yields less as the target rises: R times coverage per bag runs 2,103, then 2,055, then 1,936, then 1,908 at R-19, R-30, R-49, R-60. That is the self-compression the U.S. Department of Energy describes in loose-fill: R-value does not scale strictly with depth, because the material settles under its own weight. A calculator that divides a target R by a fixed R-per-inch overstates what you get. This model interpolates the manufacturer's own chart instead, which puts a bag at about 31.8 square feet at R-60, interpolated between the published points (the manufacturer's own R-60 figure, about 31.8, agrees).

Installed cost by attic size and target R-value

Blown fibreglass into an open, accessible attic, labour at the national mean wage, material at retail, rounded to the nearest $50. The three targets are the ENERGY STAR recommendations : R-38 is the retrofit target for zones 2 and 3 attics with some existing material, R-49 the full target for zones 2 and 3, and R-60 the target for zones 4 through 8, which cover most of the country.

Attic floor area	To R-38	To R-49	To R-60
1,000 sq ft	$1,750 to $2,250	$2,200 to $2,650	$2,600 to $3,050
1,200 sq ft	$2,100 to $2,650	$2,600 to $3,200	$3,100 to $3,700
1,500 sq ft	$2,650 to $3,350	$3,300 to $4,000	$3,900 to $4,600
2,000 sq ft	$3,500 to $4,450	$4,350 to $5,300	$5,200 to $6,150

Method for this table. Labour is 9 to 12 crew-hours per 1,000 square feet at the BLS May 2025 national mean of $26.32/hr for SOC 47-2131, times a 2.0 to 3.0 burden multiplier. The burden and the crew-hour range are estimates and the table says so here rather than in a footnote. Material is Owens Corning AttiCat at $67.58 per bag, retail price read 2026-08-07, with bag count taken from the manufacturer's coverage at each target. The model is linear in floor area, so per square foot the bands are the same at every size: $1.75 to $2.23 at R-38, $2.18 to $2.66 at R-49, and $2.60 to $3.07 at R-60. A real market has minimum job charges the model does not carry, so expect small attics to run above these bands more often than below.

Where the 2021 IECC model code calls for R-60, section R402.2.1 accepts R-49 over the whole ceiling if the insulation carries over the wall top plate at full height, which normally means a raised-heel truss. Energy codes apply to new construction and permitted work, not usually to voluntarily adding insulation to an attic you already have. Which edition applies where you live depends on your state and often your city, and your local building department is the only authority on it.

Why region matters less than cost pages say

Cost content usually asserts a large regional swing. The components do not support one. On the 1,200 square foot reference attic to R-49, material is about 78 percent of the low estimate, and material is priced nationally: the same bag costs what it costs in every state. Only the labour slice, roughly 22 percent at the low end, moves with geography.

The BLS May 2025 wage for insulation workers runs from $19.62/hr in West Virginia to $37.64/hr in Washington, a gap of 92 percent. Feed both extremes through the model on the reference attic and the installed low estimate moves by about 16 percent, because the wage only touches the labour line. A near doubling of the wage becomes a difference of a few hundred dollars, not a doubling of the job.

State	BLS mean hourly, SOC 47-2131	Model low, 1,200 sq ft to R-49
Washington	$37.64	$2,866
New York	$31.90	$2,742
Hawaii *	$33.91	$2,786
Pennsylvania	$26.28	$2,621
Texas	$23.97	$2,571
Utah	$21.00	$2,507
West Virginia	$19.62	$2,477

* Derived, not measured: BLS surveyed too few insulation workers in this state to publish a wage for SOC 47-2131, so the figure scales the national trade wage by the state's all-construction wage relative to the national one. Wages May 2025, from src/data/labor-index.ts. Model low uses the same burden and crew-hour estimates as the table above.

Real quotes vary by region more than this, but the honest reasons are mostly not the wage: they are local demand, minimum job charges, disposal fees and how busy the season is. When a quote is dramatically above the band, the explanation worth hunting for is scope, which is the next section.

What makes a real quote higher than the table

The model prices one thing: blowing fibreglass into an open, accessible, empty attic. Real attics add lines, and each of these is a legitimate reason for a bid to sit above the band.

Line item	Why it costs real money
Access	A tight hatch, low clearance or no walkway slows every hour of the job. The crew-hour estimate assumes a typical attic, not a crawl
Baffles and dams	Soffit vents need baffles before loose-fill goes near the eaves, and the hatch and any flues need dams. Skipping them blocks ventilation, so their absence from a cheap bid is a defect, not a saving
Air sealing	Sealing the ceiling penetrations before burying them is where much of the actual energy saving lives, per DOE guidance, and it is the line most often excluded. Ask whether it is in, itemised, or absent
Removal and disposal	If the old material has to come out, that is a job of its own with its own pricing. See what insulation removal costs before assuming it is included
Contamination	Rodent damage, mould or suspected vermiculite change the job entirely, and the last of those is a separate licensed trade. Start at the removal guide if any of these applies

Is this quote fair? A four-step test

Run any bid through this before signing or rejecting it. It ends in a verdict, not a shrug.

Get the scope in writing. Floor area in square feet, target R-value, bag count or coverage, and an in-or-out answer on air sealing, baffles, removal and disposal. A one-line quote with one number cannot be judged, so if the contractor will not itemise, stop here and get one who will.
Divide the price by the floor area. That gives you a per square foot figure to compare against the model band for the quoted target: $1.75 to $2.23 at R-38, $2.18 to $2.66 at R-49, $2.60 to $3.07 at R-60, material at retail.
Apply the two corrections. A quote can sit below the band honestly, because the contractor pays less than retail for material. A quote sits above the band honestly when the extra is named: hard access, baffles, air sealing, removal. Subtract the named extras and re-compare the base line.
Verdict. Base line within or below the band with a full scope: accept it. Above the band with the difference itemised and explained: fair, compare it against one more itemised bid and take the better scope, not the lower number. Above the band with no itemisation and no named reason: decline it and get another quote. The table is conservative at the low end, so a bid it flags as high is worth challenging.

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You may not need this

We do not sell insulation and we do not install it, which is why this section exists. A real share of the people pricing attic insulation should not buy any this year.

You are within about R-10 of your target. Insulation has strongly diminishing returns: the first inches over a bare ceiling do most of the work, and the last few repay slowly. Going from a nearly bare deck to R-30 saves far more than going from R-38 to R-49. Measure before you spend: the depth checker turns inches into an R-value range and compares it with the ENERGY STAR level for your climate zone.
You have not air sealed. Insulation slows conduction and does nothing about air moving through gaps around light fittings, plumbing stacks, top plates and the hatch. DOE guidance treats sealing the ceiling plane as the partner job, and on a leaky ceiling it is usually the better first spend. Insulation blown over an unsealed ceiling underperforms its label.
The existing material needs attention first. Wet, mouldy or rodent-contaminated insulation should come out before anything goes over it, and burying a problem costs the new material too. Remove or add over runs that decision.
You are about to reroof or rewire. Work that disturbs the attic wastes the new insulation. Sequence the trades, insulate last.

The rest of this section

This page gives the installed total. These break the total apart from two directions: the material side and the labour side.

Blown-in insulation cost: per square foot, per bag and installed, with the arithmetic that converts between the three.
Attic insulation installation cost: what you are paying a crew for, why a billed rate is a multiple of a wage, and what quotes commonly leave out.

Related guides

Common questions

How much does it cost to insulate an attic in 2026?: Blown fibreglass on a 1,200 square foot attic to R-49 models at about $2,600 to $3,200 installed, with the material priced at retail. Across the sizes and targets on this page, from 1,000 square feet at R-38 up to 2,000 square feet at R-60, the modelled range runs roughly $1,750 to $6,150. Two of the model's inputs, the burden multiplier and the crew hours, are estimates rather than measurements, so treat every figure as a bracket for checking quotes against, not as a price anyone owes you.
Why is the material priced at retail if contractors pay less?: Because the retail shelf price is the one figure a reader can verify today, and the trade discount has not been measured. A contractor buys the same bags below shelf price, so the material line in these tables overstates what the contractor actually pays. That bias runs one way: it makes the model conservative, which is why a real quote can come in under the low end of a table here and still be honest. When a checked supplier price exists, the model will use it and this page will change.
What R-value should I be paying for?: ENERGY STAR recommends R-30 for an uninsulated attic in climate zone 1, R-49 in zones 2 and 3, and R-60 in zones 4 through 8, which cover most of the country. An attic that already has 3 to 4 inches gets a lower target, R-49 in zones 4 through 8. Those figures are based on the 2021 IECC model code. Energy codes apply to new construction and permitted work, not usually to voluntarily adding insulation to an attic you already have. Which edition applies where you live depends on your state and often your city, and your local building department is the only authority on it.
Is there a tax credit for insulation in 2026?: The federal Section 25C credit is not available for insulation placed in service after December 31, 2025. What remains live are the state-administered Home Energy Rebates from the Inflation Reduction Act, the HOMES and HEAR programmes, and insulation and air sealing qualify under both. Availability differs by state, programmes open and close, and some have waitlists, so check with your own State Energy Office before counting any rebate in a budget. No page on this site will quote you a rebate amount, because a cached amount goes wrong within weeks.
Why do two quotes for the same attic differ so much?: Usually because they are not quoting the same job. The lines that most often differ are air sealing (frequently excluded), baffles at the eaves, removal or disposal of the old material, and the target R-value itself, which one bid may quietly set lower than the other. Ask each contractor to state the floor area, the target R-value, the bag count or coverage, and whether air sealing, baffles and disposal are in or out. Most of the spread between bids disappears once the scopes actually match.
Is it much cheaper to blow the insulation in myself?: Cheaper, but by less than it looks. Labour and its burden are about 22 percent of the model's low estimate; the rest is material, which you buy at the same retail shelf price the tables here use, while a contractor buys below it. You also take on the blowing machine, baffles, and the prep work in a hot attic. It is a genuine option for a walkable, accessible attic that needs no removal and no air sealing. For anything else, the gap between doing it yourself and hiring narrows quickly.

Sources: Wages from BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, SOC 47-2131 (Insulation Workers, Floor, Ceiling and Wall), retrieved via the BLS public API; two states and the District of Columbia are derived from the jurisdiction's all-construction wage where BLS suppresses the trade figure, and are marked wherever shown. Material price and coverage from the Owens Corning AttiCat retail listing and manufacturer coverage chart, read 2026-08-07; retail shelf price, which a contractor buys below. The burden multiplier and crew-hour productivity are estimates, not measurements, and every total on this page inherits that. Recommended R-values from ENERGY STAR, "Recommended Home Insulation R-Values", based on 2021 IECC Table R402.1.3. Loose-fill R-value does not scale strictly with depth, per DOE, so coverage is interpolated from the manufacturer's chart rather than from a fixed R-per-inch. Section 25C status per 26 U.S.C. 25C(i) as amended by P.L. 119-21. Page reviewed August 2026. Corrections: [email protected].