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How Much Does Stump Grinding Cost?
Stump grinding costs between $275 and $1,100 including GST for most single stumps, and the biggest factor in the price is how wide the stump is at ground level. Protruding roots and a tall stump add to that. Price yours with the free stump grinding calculator below, then see the price chart by stump size, what root grinding adds, and how grinding compares with stump removal.
Stump grinding cost calculator
What root grinding adds to the cost
As a rough guide, on top of the stump itself: roots within about 30 cm add around $60, out to 60 cm around $140, and out to 90 cm around $220. Past 90 cm it stops being a stump job with a bit of root work attached and becomes a root job, which is why the calculator gives that band as a range rather than a figure: anywhere from $220 to $440, and genuinely dependent on what is there.
One thing worth checking before any of it: if the roots you want gone belong to a tree that is staying, and that tree is protected, grinding them may not be lawful. More on that below.
What the job involves, from how deep the stump is ground to whether the roots come out, is on our stump grinding page.
Stump grinding price chart
Stump grinding in Brisbane costs from $275 for a small stump to $1,100–$1,265 for one a metre across, including GST, and the price rises in step with the stump's diameter at ground level. These are base rates for one stump, cut low, with no protruding roots and reasonable access. Roots and a tall stump add to them, and the calculator above prices both.
| Stump diameter | Typical range |
|---|---|
| 20 cm | $275 – $315 |
| 30 cm | $330 – $380 |
| 40 cm | $440 – $505 |
| 50 cm | $550 – $635 |
| 60 cm | $660 – $760 |
| 80 cm | $880 – $1,010 |
| 100 cm | $1,100 – $1,265 |
Stump grinding costs in Brisbane
Brisbane pricing sits close to the national picture, and the figures on this page are the Brisbane market. A suburban stump on a flat block with side access is a routine job here and should be quoted as one. Where local prices move is access: a great many Brisbane properties are Queenslanders on sloping blocks with narrow side paths, and a stump behind one of those is genuinely a harder job than the same stump on a flat suburban block.
The regulatory point is worth knowing, because it is the one that costs real money. Grinding the stump of a tree you removed lawfully is simply the end of that job. But grinding roots inside the drip zone of a protected tree you are keeping is regulated in its own right — Brisbane City Council's Natural Assets Local Law treats damaging roots by excavating inside that zone as damaging the tree, and the penalties run to tens of thousands of dollars. Neighbouring trees count. If the surface roots annoying you belong to a tree that is staying, get the position confirmed before the machine arrives.
And grinding out the stump of a protected tree that came down without a permit does not resolve anything. The offence was the removal, and a missing stump makes it harder to explain, not easier.
What changes the price of stump grinding
Stump diameter
The main driver, and close to linear — about a dollar a millimetre measured across at ground level. Doubling the width roughly doubles the price, because the volume of timber the wheel has to chip through goes up with it.
Access
The one that surprises people. A stump reachable by a tracked machine is a different job from the same stump behind a 750 mm gate, up steps, or through a house. Narrow-access machines are slower and some jobs need the stump hand-cut down first. Measure your narrowest gate before you ring anyone.
Species and root spread
Dense hardwoods — ironbark, spotted gum — wear teeth faster and grind slower than a camphor laurel or a poinciana of the same size. Species also decides how far the surface roots run, which is priced separately and is where a job most often runs past its estimate.
How many stumps
The first stump carries the travel and the machine transport. Every stump after it on the same visit is much cheaper, which is why four small stumps in one morning cost far less than four separate call-outs.
Where the grindings go
Leaving the chip in the hole is standard and free. Having it dug out and carted away, and the hole backfilled with clean soil, is extra — it is a barrow job and a tip fee. Worth paying for if you are planting or turfing, and worth declining if you are not.
What is under the stump
Irrigation, sprinkler lines, phone and power services and old fence footings all live where stumps live, and a grinder finds them the hard way. A contractor who asks about services before quoting is being careful, not slow.
Getting rid of a stump yourself
You can get rid of a tree stump yourself by digging it out, speeding up its decay with a stump remover, or hiring a grinder for the day — and on paper each costs less than a quote. Which one actually saves money depends on the size of the stump, how soon you want the ground back, and what is buried around it.
Digging one out by hand
Possible, and much harder than it looks. A 300 mm stump means digging a trench right around it, severing every lateral root with a mattock or a reciprocating saw, and then levering out a root plate that weighs more than you do. Reckon on a full weekend for one modest stump, and considerably more if the soil is Brisbane clay.
It is genuinely feasible for a small, young stump in soft ground. For anything with a decade of growth behind it, people generally stop halfway and ring someone.
Does stump dissolver actually work?
Not in the way the packaging implies. The products sold as stump remover or stump dissolver are almost all potassium nitrate, which does not dissolve wood — it feeds the fungi and bacteria already breaking the stump down, so decay runs faster than it otherwise would.
That means it works slowly, it works best on a stump that is already dead and dry, and it does very little to a green stump cut last month. Realistically you are looking at many months to a couple of years, and at the end of it you have a soft, rotten stump you still have to dig out. If you have the time and no deadline it costs almost nothing. If you want the ground back this season, it is not the answer.
Burning stumps out is the other folk remedy. It is slow, it is unreliable below ground, and in most of South East Queensland lighting a fire in a suburban yard is not lawful without a permit.
When DIY costs more than the quote
Hiring a grinder for a day is cheaper than a single-stump quote, so on paper the sums favour doing it yourself. Three things usually reverse that.
The hire machines available to the public are small, and a small grinder on a large hardwood stump is a very long day. You are also responsible for what the wheel hits — an irrigation line is an annoyance, a power or comms service is not. And the teeth are consumables: blunt a set on a stump full of grit and the hire company bills you for them.
The honest summary is that DIY grinding makes sense for a couple of small, clean stumps in open ground on a property you know well. For one big stump it is usually a false economy, and for a stump near services it is a bad bet.
Stump grinding cost questions
How much does it cost to grind a tree stump?
In Brisbane a single stump generally grinds out for $275 to $1,100 including GST, and the number tracks diameter more closely than anything else — roughly a dollar a millimetre measured across the stump at ground level, with a minimum charge underneath it. Protruding roots and a stump left standing tall are the two things that push a job past that.
How much should stump grinding cost?
Measure across the stump at ground level and work on about $1 a millimetre plus GST as your yardstick — a 400 mm stump around $440, a 600 mm stump around $660. Below roughly $275 you are into minimum-charge territory, because getting a machine to the address costs the same whether the stump is small or not. A quote well above the yardstick is not automatically wrong, but it should come with a reason: bad access, roots running metres across a lawn, or grindings being carted away.
Is stump grinding cheaper than stump removal?
Considerably, and it is what almost everybody actually wants. Grinding chips the stump away in place with a cutting wheel and leaves the surrounding ground intact. Full removal means excavating the root plate out of the ground, which needs a machine with reach, leaves a hole you have to fill, and can undermine paths, services and neighbouring trees. Removal is warranted where something is going to be built on the spot. For turf, garden or a replacement tree, grinding does the job for a fraction of it.
Not sure the tree needs to come out at all?
If the stump does not exist yet, that decision is still open. A risk assessment costs a fraction of a removal and regularly finds that pruning resolves the problem — and it comes from a practice with nothing to gain from the removal.