Toilet paper calculator estimates how long your stash will last

If the coronavirus pandemic wasn’t bad enough, people have been taking to supermarkets all over the world and stockpiling copious amounts of toilet roll - leaving shelves bare.

By remaining calm and considerate, the reality is - there is plenty of toilet paper to go round - meaning there’s no need to panic purchase. 

Unfortunately it seems that some people don’t believe the facts. 

In order to confirm the ludicrous nature of some people’s toilet roll purchasing behaviours, a new online calculator has appeared to help people find out how long their toilet roll stash will last them. 

The online resource called How Much Toilet Paper?, shows users how long they will last with their current stock of toilet paper - based on the number of toilet trips and quantity of toilet paper per visit. 

On arriving at the website it starts with the average of 10 rolls left in the home and three visits per day. Given that scenario - it says this you will have enough toilet paper to last you 53 days – which is a substantial amount of time.

How Much Toilet Roll? creators Ben Sassoon and Sam Harris, both software development professionals said: "The calculation method is very simple: essentially, it calculates the number of days your rolls will last by looking at how many pieces of paper are used, on average, for each trip to the toilet. 

“Our average user has 500% more toilet paper than they would need in a potential quarantine. We are hoping that people will use the site and see they don’t need to go out and empty the shelves,”

The two young developers came up with this lighthearted idea when they realised how much stock must be accumulating in people’s households. 

The pair commented: "We saw that toilet paper was running out in the shops and we weren't sure why. After seeing the numbers, it became clear that people were buying far more toilet paper than they needed. We realised that the best way to educate people was to create a really simple tool like this.” 

If you want to get particularly technical, you can explore the advanced options, such as the number of people in the household, number of sheets per roll and average number of wipes per visit.

The website notes that it has now been used by over 2,000,000 people and is helping to reduce toilet paper shortage round the world.