How to Install Concrete Pavers
Transform outdoor ground by excavating a stable foundation, screeding a sand bed, laying interlocking concrete pavers, and securing them with polymeric sand.
- Read the tools, materials, safety notes, and steps below for free.
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- Allow camera and microphone. Point your phone at the work; the coach watches your progress and tells you the next step.
🧰 Required Tools & Equipment
- ✓ Flat spade shovel
- ✓ Plate compactor (or hand tamper)
- ✓ 4-foot level
- ✓ 1-inch diameter PVC or conduit screed pipes
- ✓ Straight 2x4 screed board
- ✓ Rubber mallet
- ✓ Masonry saw or angle grinder with diamond blade
📦 Materials & Supplies
- ✓ Concrete pavers
- ✓ Crushed stone road base (Class 5 or 3/4-inch minus)
- ✓ Coarse washed bedding sand (ASTM C33)
- ✓ Polymeric sand
- ✓ Heavy-duty landscape fabric
- ✓ Plastic paver edge restraints with 10-inch steel spikes
⚠️ Safety Checkpoints & Warnings
- • Call 811 to locate buried utilities before digging into the ground.
- • Wear an N95 or P100 respirator and eye protection when cutting pavers and sweeping polymeric sand to prevent silica inhalation.
- • Wear steel-toe work boots and heavy work gloves when moving heavy stone pallets and operating compaction machinery.
📋 Step-by-Step Guide (6 Steps)
Excavate the Patio Area
Stake out the perimeter with mason line and dig out the turf and soil to a total depth of 7 to 8 inches. Pitch the excavation away from nearby foundations with a 1-inch drop for every 8 feet of run. Clear all organic roots and rake the bare dirt flat before proceeding.
- • Excavated bed is 7-8 inches below surrounding turf lines across the entire footprint.
- • Soil bed slopes continuously away from house structures with no bowl-shaped depressions.
- • Digging too shallow and leaving no room for a 4-inch compacted gravel base.
- • Creating a level trench that traps water against the home foundation.
Install Fabric, Add Base, and Compact
Roll heavy-duty landscape fabric over the exposed dirt floor to stop subsoil migration. Spread crushed gravel base in two separate 2-inch thick layers, dampening lightly with water. Run the plate compactor over each layer at least three passes until the base is rigid and unyielding.
- • Compacted gravel forms a rock-hard 4-inch deep foundation.
- • Walking across the gravel produces zero visible shoe impressions.
- • Adding all 4 inches of gravel at once, preventing deep compaction.
- • Compacting bone-dry gravel, which fails to bind properly.
Set Screed Pipes and Spread Bedding Sand
Place two 1-inch outer-diameter conduit pipes parallel along the compacted base roughly 6 feet apart. Dump coarse bedding sand between them and drag your straight 2x4 board smoothly over the rails to strike off a perfect 1-inch layer. Remove the pipes and gently fill the remaining channel voids with loose sand.
- • Sand layer is exactly 1 inch thick, uniformly smooth, and entirely uncompacted.
- • No footprints, tool gouges, or rail ridges present across the screeded zone.
- • Compacting or walking directly on the screeded sand layer.
- • Using fine masonry sand or play sand instead of coarse, angular washed concrete sand.
Lay the Concrete Pavers
Start in a square 90-degree corner and place each paver straight down into the sand using a click-and-drop technique against adjacent pavers. Maintain tight, uniform joint lines without sliding pavers across the screeded sand. Keep knees on top of freshly laid pavers while working forward.
- • Pavers sit flush against each other with consistent 1/8-inch joint gaps.
- • Surface level matches the planned drainage slope without proud or sunken corners.
- • Sliding pavers sideways along the bed, which bulldozes sand and creates lippage.
- • Laying rows out of square by failing to follow perpendicular chalk lines.
Cut Border Stones and Secure Edge Restraints
Mark edge stones with a pencil where cuts are required to complete the perimeter pattern, then cut them using a masonry saw. Place rigid plastic paver edging directly against the outer paver perimeter resting atop the compacted gravel base. Drive 10-inch steel spikes through the edging brackets into the base every 12 inches.
- • All cut perimeter stones fit snugly with gaps under 1/4 inch.
- • Plastic edging sits tightly against paver sides, pegged securely into gravel with no flex.
- • Installing the edge restraint on top of loose sand rather than direct on compacted base.
- • Leaving long gaps between edge restraint anchor spikes.
Sweep Polymeric Sand and Final Compact
Ensure the entire paver surface is completely bone dry before pouring polymeric sand across the patio. Sweep sand thoroughly into all joints using a push broom, then run the plate compactor (fitted with a protective rubber pad) over the pavers to settle the sand. Sweep in a final top-up, blow off excess dust with a leaf blower, and gently mist the area with water 3 times at 5-minute intervals to activate the binder.
- • Joints are filled with sand to within 1/8 inch below the paver chamfer edge.
- • Paver faces are pristine and free of residual white sand haze before water activation.
- • Applying polymeric sand while the paver surface is wet, causing permanent polymer staining.
- • Wetting the area with heavy water pressure, which washes the polymer binder right out of the joints.
Credit: inspired by an original tutorial by This Old House — watch the original on YouTube.
Don’t have everything?
- No Plate compactor? Heavy 8x8-inch steel hand tamper (requires extra physical effort and smaller gravel lifts)
- No Masonry saw? Angle grinder with a 4.5-inch diamond masonry wheel (score top/bottom and snap with brick chisel)
- No Conduit screed pipes? 1-inch outer diameter rigid PVC electrical conduit