How much more does a double garage door cost compared to two single doors in Ottawa?

In Ottawa, a single double-wide garage door is almost always less expensive than two separate single doors, and the price difference is significant enough to matter. A standard 16-foot double insulated steel door typically costs $2,500 to $4,200 installed, while two 8-foot or 9-foot single doors would run $3,000 to $5,600 installed. So you are saving roughly $500 to $1,400 by going with one double door instead of two singles.

The savings come from several places. With one double door, you need one opener instead of two, one set of tracks and hardware instead of two, and the installation labour is shorter because the technician is doing one setup instead of two complete door systems. You also need only one header beam across the opening instead of a header for each opening plus a structural post in the middle.

That said, there are real reasons some Ottawa homeowners prefer two single doors, and they are not all about looks. Two single doors give you redundancy. If one door breaks or a spring snaps, you still have the other door working. With a single double door, a broken spring means your entire garage is inaccessible until the repair is done. In Ottawa, where a spring might snap on the coldest morning of the year, that redundancy has practical value.

Two single doors also handle wind loads better. A 16-foot wide door has a lot of surface area for Ottawa's winter winds to push against, and it requires heavier-duty tracks, reinforcement struts, and stronger springs to resist bowing. Two 8-foot doors each have half the wind exposure and are inherently more rigid because they are narrower. This is especially relevant if your garage faces west or north, where Ottawa's prevailing winter winds hit hardest.

From an insulation standpoint, two single doors with a center post between them actually provide slightly better thermal performance than one double door. That center post adds a few inches of insulated wall where the double door would have a continuous panel of steel and foam. The difference is small but measurable.

The aesthetic argument usually favours two single doors for traditional home styles and one double door for modern or contemporary homes. Carriage house style single doors with decorative hardware look particularly good on Ottawa homes built in older neighbourhoods like the Glebe, Westboro, or Rockcliffe. A clean, flush double door suits newer builds in Kanata, Barrhaven, or Stittsville.

If you currently have a double door opening and want to convert to two singles, expect to add $800 to $1,500 for the structural post installation in the center. Going the other direction, removing a center post to install a double door, requires a structural engineer to specify the header beam, and that conversion can add $1,500 to $3,000 depending on the span and load above.

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• 613Bins
• JC Carpentry
• M.O.T. CONSTRUCTION INC.
• The Fixer
• Titley Construction