Asphalt is ordered by the ton, not by the yard, and that is the first thing that trips people up. The conversion runs through density, and density for hot mix is high — around two tons per cubic yard — so a driveway that sounds small on paper arrives as a serious weight.
Compacted thickness is what you specify
Every thickness figure quoted for asphalt is the compacted thickness — what is there after the roller has been over it. The loose material you spread is roughly a quarter thicker than the finished result.
Two inches compacted is enough for a footpath or a patio surround. Three inches is the normal figure for a residential driveway carrying cars. Four inches or more is for anything a delivery truck will turn on, and for driveways over soft or clay subgrade.
Enter the compacted number here. The tonnage comes out right, and the contractor spreading it will allow for the loose lift themselves.
The base matters more than the surface
Asphalt is flexible. It does not bridge a soft spot the way concrete does — it follows whatever is underneath it, which means a driveway that fails almost always failed in the base, not in the asphalt.
A typical residential base is six to eight inches of compacted crushed stone. Over clay it can want more, and over anything organic the soil has to come out first.
Money spent on base depth is worth more than money spent on asphalt depth, every time.
Hot mix, cold patch, and what they are for
Hot mix is the real thing — delivered hot, spread and rolled while it is still workable, and it has to be placed within a fairly tight time window. It is not a material you buy in bags and it is not a one-person job.
Cold patch out of a bag is a repair product. It is lighter, it never reaches the same density, and it will not cure into a structural surface. It is correct for filling a pothole and wrong for surfacing a driveway.
If you are estimating a bagged repair, use the bag figures here as a rough guide and expect to be a little over.
What it weighs
This is where the arithmetic gets a person's attention. A modest twenty by forty driveway at three inches compacted is about 7.4 cubic yards, and at 4,050 pounds per cubic yard that is roughly fifteen tons.
Fifteen tons is a tandem dump truck. It is not a trailer, not a pickup, not several trips. The calculator shows the weight and the truck loads so the scale of the job is visible before anyone orders anything.
Sealing, and when not to
New asphalt should not be sealed immediately. It needs months to cure and release its oils — usually a full season — and sealing too early traps them and leaves a soft surface.
After that, sealing every few years extends the life considerably. The sealer calculator on this site handles that quantity separately, since coverage is per gallon rather than per ton.