Guides

Measuring rooms with iPhone LiDAR

Published November 3, 2026

The LiDAR scanner on iPhone Pro models can map a room in about the time it takes to walk around it. Used well, it's fast and close enough to quote from. Used carelessly, it misses closets and misjudges walls. Here's what it is, what affects it, and how to get a clean scan.

What LiDAR is

LiDAR stands for light detection and ranging. The scanner sends out pulses of infrared light, invisible to the eye, and times how long they take to bounce back. From those timings the phone builds a depth map of what's in front of it. At the same time, the camera and motion sensors track where the phone is as you move, so the depth readings can be stitched together into a model of the whole room.

The scanner works best within a few metres of what it's measuring. That's why you scan a room by walking it, not by standing in the middle and turning around.

Which iPhones have it

LiDAR is on iPhone Pro and Pro Max models from iPhone 12 Pro onward. Other iPhones don't have it. On a Pro model, the scanner is the small black circle in the camera bump, beside the lenses. If you're not sure which model you have, look in Settings → General → About.

Without LiDAR you can still measure with a tape and draw the room. How to measure a room for flooring covers that method.

What affects accuracy

Treat a scan like a tape measurement taken quickly: close, but worth checking where it matters. These are the usual causes of trouble:

• Moving too fast. Walking quickly or swinging the phone can make the tracking drift, which shows up as walls that don't quite meet.
• Dim light and blank walls. The camera tracks movement using visual detail, so a dark room or a long, featureless wall makes its job harder.
• Difficult surfaces. Mirrors, glass, glossy cabinets and very dark materials can reflect or absorb the infrared light and give weaker readings.
• Clutter. A sofa against a wall hides the line where wall meets floor.
• Long rooms. In long rooms and hallways, small tracking errors can add up along the length.

An inch over 15 feet, or 2 cm over 4.6 m, doesn't change the order; the waste allowance absorbs it. It does matter for anything cut to an exact length, like a threshold or a stair nose, so measure those with a tape.

Tips for a clean scan

1. Clear the edges. Move what you can away from the walls and open closet doors, so the scanner can see where wall meets floor.
2. Turn the lights on. Open blinds and switch on overhead lights.
3. Start in a corner. Hold the phone at chest height, pointed at the walls.
4. Walk slowly. Go around the room at an easy pace and point at every corner and doorway as you pass it.
5. Finish where you started. Closing the loop helps the scan line up the last wall with the first.
6. Don't skip closets and alcoves. Step into them so their walls get scanned too.
7. Check one wall with a tape. Measure the longest wall and compare. If the two disagree by more than you're comfortable with, scan again more slowly.
8. Look at what LiDAR can't see. Floor height changes, soft spots, squeaks and damaged subfloor still need your eyes and your feet.

When to measure by hand instead

Use a tape when the room is full of mirrors or glass, when the walls are hidden behind furniture you can't move, or when you need an exact length rather than an area. The two methods work well together: scan for the shape and area, then tape the few dimensions that have to be exact.

How Parquo does it

On iPhone Pro models from iPhone 12 Pro onward, Parquo uses LiDAR to trace each wall and doorway as you walk the room, then carries the floor area into the price: boxes, waste by pattern, underlayment, transitions and baseboard. On other iPhones, you draw the room by hand. Either way, check the longest wall with a tape before you quote.

Related guides

• How to measure a room for flooring
• How many boxes of flooring do you need?
• How to write a flooring quote customers sign