Kitchen Cabinet Codes Explained: How to Read Any Cabinet Quote

A cabinet quote arrives and it reads like this:

SB36   B24   3DB18   BBC42   W3030GD   U309624   F396

Seven line items, several thousand dollars, and nothing a normal person can check. Most buyers sign it anyway, which is how kitchens end up one filler strip short on installation day.

The good news: these codes are not arbitrary. They follow a grammar that is roughly consistent across the whole industry, and once you know it you can read a quote from anyone. This guide teaches the grammar first, then covers the letter groups category by category, then explains the part everyone gets caught by — why the same cabinet has a different code at every company.

The One Rule Behind Almost Every Cabinet Code

Nearly every cabinet code splits into two parts:

Letters first, numbers second. The letters are the part that varies between companies. The numbers are close to universal — and the numbers are what actually has to fit your wall, so start there.

How the Numbers Work

The digit count tells you which dimensions are being specified. Anything not stated is the standard dimension for that cabinet type.

Pattern	Reads as	Example
2 digits	Width only. Height and depth are the standard for that type.	B24 — base cabinet, 24″ wide
4 digits	Width, then height. Depth is standard.	W3030 — wall cabinet, 30″ wide × 30″ high
6 digits	Width, then height, then depth.	W361224 — wall cabinet, 36″ wide × 12″ high × 24″ deep

Read them in pairs, left to right, and the meaning falls out. U309624 is a utility cabinet 30″ wide, 96″ high, 24″ deep. W421824 is a wall cabinet 42″ wide, 18″ high, 24″ deep — an over-refrigerator cabinet, deeper than a normal wall box so it sits flush with the fridge.

Base Cabinet Codes

Base cabinets sit on the floor and carry the countertop. The standard box is 34½″ high and 24″ deep, so most base codes state width only.

Code	Meaning	What it is
B	Base	The default: one door, one drawer above it. B24 is 24″ wide.
SB	Sink Base	No drawer and no floor, to clear the plumbing. The drawer front is false.
FSB	Farm Sink Base	Cut down at the front to accept an apron-front sink.
CSB	Corner Sink Base	Angled front for a sink set diagonally into a corner.
2DB / 3DB	2- or 3-Drawer Base	All drawers, no door. The leading digit is the drawer count, not a dimension.
BBC	Blind Base Corner	Turns a corner. Part of the box is "blind" — hidden behind the adjoining run.
ERB	Easy Reach Base	Corner cabinet with an angled door, so the whole interior is reachable.
LSB	Lazy Susan Base	Corner base fitted with a rotating shelf.
BES	Base End Shelf	Open curved shelving that finishes the end of a run.
BEC	Base End Cabinet	Closed cabinet designed to terminate a run cleanly.
BWB	Base Waste Bin	Base built to house pull-out bins.
MB	Microwave Base	Base with an opening sized for a built-in microwave.
SPB	Spice Base	Narrow pull-out, typically 6″ or 9″ wide, for bottles and jars.

Wall Cabinet Codes

Wall cabinets hang above the counter. Standard depth is 12″, and because height genuinely varies, wall codes almost always carry four digits — width then height.

Code	Meaning	What it is
W	Wall	The default upper cabinet. W3030 is 30″ wide × 30″ high.
WBC	Wall Blind Corner	The upper equivalent of BBC.
WER	Wall Easy Reach	Corner upper with an angled door.
DCW	Diagonal Corner Wall	Corner upper whose face sits at 45° to both walls.
AW	Angle Wall	Angled transition cabinet, often used where a run meets a window or wall return.
MO	Microwave / Over-range	Short wall cabinet sized to sit above a range or an over-range microwave.
OE	Open End	Open shelving that finishes the end of an upper run. Usually 6″ wide.

Tall, Pantry and Oven Cabinets

Tall cabinets run floor to near-ceiling, so all three dimensions matter and these codes carry six digits.

Code	Meaning	What it is
U	Utility / pantry	Full-height storage cabinet. U309624 = 30″ × 96″ × 24″.
O	Oven cabinet	Tall cabinet with a cut-out for a built-in wall oven.

The three standard tall heights are 84″, 90″ and 96″, matching the three standard ceiling treatments. If your ceiling is 8 feet (96″), a 96″ cabinet leaves no room for crown molding or for tipping the cabinet upright during installation — which is why 90″ plus molding is the more common choice.

Vanity Cabinets

Bathroom vanities use their own prefixes because the standard box is different: shallower (21″ deep) and traditionally shorter than a kitchen base.

Code	Meaning
V	Vanity — the general prefix
VS	Vanity Sink base
VSD	Vanity Sink base with Drawers
3VDB	3-Drawer Vanity Base — all drawers, no sink

Suffixes: the Small Letters That Change the Product

A suffix modifies the cabinet the prefix already described. These are easy to skim past and expensive to get wrong.

Suffix	Meaning	Why it matters
GD	Glass Door	Usually ships as a frame with no glass, and the interior becomes visible — many buyers then want a finished interior.
FH	Full Height door	A base with a full-height door and no top drawer. Ordering the wrong one loses you a drawer you assumed was included.
L / R	Hinge or door side	Left or right. Sides are stated as you face the cabinet. Getting this wrong on a corner or an end cabinet means the door opens into a wall.

Fillers, Panels and Moldings — the Lines People Forget

These are not cabinets, which is exactly why they get dropped from a quote. A kitchen missing them is not installable.

Code	Meaning	What it does
F	Filler	A flat strip that absorbs out-of-square walls and buys door clearance in corners. F396 is 3″ wide × 96″ long.
TKC	Toe Kick	Finished strip covering the recess at the floor.
BDEP / WDEP / TDEP / VDEP	Base / Wall / Tall / Vanity Decorative End Panel	Finishes an exposed cabinet side so it matches the doors instead of showing a plain box side.
WSV / USV	Wall / Utility Skin Veneer	Thin matching panel for covering an exposed side more economically than a decorative panel.
CM	Crown Molding	Tops the upper run. The digit is the profile size.
LRM	Light Rail Molding	Runs along the underside of wall cabinets and hides under-cabinet lighting.
SM	Scribe Molding	Thin trim closing the gap where cabinets meet an uneven wall or ceiling.
SHM	Shoe Molding	Trim at the base of the toe kick.
RS	Roll-out Shelf	Pull-out shelf added inside a base cabinet. Sized to the cabinet width.

A quote listing only cabinet boxes is an incomplete quote, not a cheap one. When you compare two proposals, confirm both include fillers, end panels and molding before you compare the totals — a point we go into further in our comparison of RTA and custom cabinets.

Why the Same Cabinet Has a Different Code Everywhere

Here is the part no size chart tells you: there is no industry standard for cabinet nomenclature. The numbering conventions above are near-universal, because inches are inches. The letters are not. Each manufacturer developed its own abbreviations, and they were never reconciled.

The practical consequence is that a code from one company will not reliably match another company's catalog. The variations you will actually run into:

• Prefix vs. suffix order. The same drawer base may lead with the drawer count or append it — a 3-drawer 24″ base can appear with the count in front or behind the width.
• Different abbreviations for the same thing. A sink base may be written as sink-base-then-width, or base-then-width-then-sink. Both mean one cabinet with no floor and a false drawer front.
• Omitted standard dimensions. One catalog states the depth on every wall cabinet; another states it only when it is non-standard. The cabinets are identical.
• Glass doors as a suffix or a separate prefix. Sometimes appended to the base code, sometimes given its own letter at the front.
• Corner cabinets. The least consistent category in the industry. "Blind", "easy reach", "diagonal" and "lazy susan" describe genuinely different products, but the abbreviations for them overlap between companies.

You can check our full size and code list on the framed cabinet pages, where every cabinet lists its dimensions alongside its code for exactly this reason.

What the Codes Do Not Tell You

A code describes geometry. It says nothing about how the cabinet is built — and two cabinets with an identical B30 code can differ enormously in box material, joinery, drawer slides and finish durability.

For construction quality there is a real standard, and it is worth knowing because it is the only one that exists. The Kitchen Cabinet Manufacturers Association administers ANSI/KCMA A161.1, the sole performance standard for kitchen and vanity cabinets. Certification requires testing in eight categories at an accredited independent laboratory: doors and drawers are cycled 25,000 times, wall cabinets are loaded to 600 pounds, shelves undergo long-term load testing, and finished surfaces are exposed to a series of stains and chemicals. The standard is recognised by the American Institute of Architects, the National Association of the Remodeling Industry and the National Kitchen & Bath Association, and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development specifies A161.1-certified cabinetry for dwelling units.

So when you have finished decoding a quote, ask the questions the codes cannot answer:

• What is the box made of, and how thick are the sides, back and shelves?
• How are the drawer boxes joined, and what is their weight rating?
• Are the slides full-extension and undermount? Are the hinges soft-close and adjustable?
• How is the finish applied and cured on doors and exposed ends?
• What does the warranty cover, and how are replacement parts handled?

A Five-Minute Check on Any Cabinet Quote

Run this before you approve an order. It catches the errors that are cheap now and expensive later.

1. Decode every line. Write the plain-English description next to each code. Anything you cannot decode, ask about — including on your own supplier's quote.
2. Add the widths per wall. Total the cabinet widths for each run and compare against your measured wall length. If the arithmetic does not close, something is wrong in the order.
3. Check every hinge suffix against your floor plan, cabinet by cabinet.
4. Confirm the fillers. At least one at each end of every run, plus corners. A quote with zero fillers has an error in it.
5. Confirm exposed sides are panelled. Every cabinet end that will be visible needs a decorative panel or skin.
6. Confirm molding length covers the full run, not just the cabinet fronts.
7. Check tall cabinet height against your actual ceiling, including molding and installation clearance.
8. Match appliance openings to the spec sheets for the exact models you are buying.

Steps 2 and 7 depend on having accurate measurements in the first place. If you have not measured yet, our step-by-step kitchen measuring guide covers the wall-by-wall method to use before any of this.