Types of Wood Fences: 5 Woods, 10 Styles and Lifespans

The main types of wood fences are sorted two ways: by the wood - pressure-treated pine, cedar, redwood, cypress or spruce - and by the style, such as privacy, board-on-board, shadowbox, picket, split rail or horizontal. You choose one of each. The wood decides how long the fence lasts and what it costs; the style decides how much it hides, how much wind it catches and how much lumber it uses.

The USDA Forest Products Laboratory's Wood Handbook treats fences like decks: fully exposed to the weather, with some parts, the posts, in contact with the ground, so decay and termites are the real threats. Its rule is simple. Use lumber pressure-treated with preservatives, or the heartwood - the dark, not light-coloured part - of a naturally durable species, for every post and every other part that touches soil.

• Pressure-treated pine - usually southern pine, treated with a copper-based preservative. Buy posts tagged UC4A (general ground contact); boards two inches thick or less may be treated only for above-ground use, which AWPA warns will not last long in the ground. Fixr lists $3 to $10 per linear foot for materials (updated 31 January 2025).
• Cedar - western redcedar, northern white-cedar, eastern redcedar and the other cedars sit in the USDA 'resistant' heartwood group. It is also light and soft: western redcedar has a specific gravity of 0.32 and 350 lbf side hardness at 12% moisture, against 0.51 and 690 lbf for loblolly pine. Fixr: $5 to $15.
• Redwood - old-growth heartwood is 'resistant', young-growth only 'moderately resistant', so ask the yard which one you are buying. Fixr: $15 to $30, the most expensive of the five.
• Cypress - the same split: old-growth baldcypress is resistant, young-growth moderately resistant. Fixr: $10 to $15.
• Spruce - the spruces are in the 'slightly or nonresistant' group, so untreated spruce pickets need a finish and should never be used as posts. Fixr: $3 to $10.

Two more woods show up for posts on farms and old homesteads: black locust and osage-orange, the only native woods the handbook rates 'very resistant'. The handbook adds that decay resistance drops in ground contact and in warm, humid climates, and that sapwood of essentially every species has low resistance.

• Privacy (solid or stockade) - boards butted edge to edge on one side of the rails. Fixr puts stockade at $15 to $20 and privacy fences at $17 to $37 per linear foot installed.
• Board-on-board - two staggered layers of boards that overlap, so no gap opens when the wood shrinks. The most complete privacy of the solid styles, and it uses the most lumber.
• Shadowbox (good neighbor) - boards alternate on each side of the rails, so both neighbours see the same finished face, and air moves through the offset gaps.
• Picket - short spaced boards, usually decorative front-yard fencing; Fixr lists $10 to $18 installed.
• Split rail - two or three horizontal rails through mortised posts, used to mark a line rather than hide anything; the cheapest at $8 to $16 installed (Fixr).
• Horizontal - boards run sideways between posts for a modern look; Fixr lists $15 to $22.
• Lattice top - a privacy fence with a strip of lattice on top to add height without a solid wall.
• Dog-ear - privacy boards with the top corners clipped at an angle.
• Scalloped - picket or privacy tops cut to a curve between posts.
• Basket weave - thin boards woven between vertical supports.

All the Fixr figures are national cost ranges from its page updated 31 January 2025; local quotes will differ.

Posts fail first, so the post decides the fence. A UC4A-tagged treated post or a heartwood post of black locust, osage-orange or cedar is the long-life choice; a spruce or untreated pine post is not. Fixr cites 10 to 15 years for pressure-treated pine fences, about 20 years for quality wood fencing with routine maintenance, and up to 80 years for well-maintained black locust - treat those as that site's estimates, not test results.

Above ground, the handbook says the service lives of naturally durable and preservative-treated woods are quite comparable, and that weathering - checking, splitting and warping - often ends a deck or fence's life before decay does. Its fix is to keep water beading on the surface: water repellents and penetrating stains, reapplied when water starts soaking in. Seal cut end grain during construction, because a painted rail with open end grain traps water behind the film and peels.

The USDA Wood Handbook's service-life table gives the numbers for rough-sawn wood, which is what most fence boards are: a semitransparent stain lasts 4 to 8 years, a solid-colour stain 6 to 15 years, and a clear water-repellent preservative only 1 to 3 years, though the handbook notes reapplication is easy on fences. Our types of stain for wood page explains each finish.

Cedar, redwood and oak are rich in tannins, and plain carbon-steel nails react with them to leave dark blue-black streaks. The handbook says stainless steel fasteners are safe from iron stain and that high-quality hot-dip galvanized fasteners meeting ASTM A153 are far less likely to cause it. Pine lacks those tannins, so rusty nails only leave a brown ring. Do not clean a cedar fence with steel wool for the same reason.

If you are removing an old fence, age matters. Wood treated with chromated copper arsenate (CCA), commonly called green treated, dominated the market from the late 1970s until 2004, and EPA's label still allows CCA for round fence posts on farms and other industrial uses. EPA says never to burn treated wood in a residential setting and to wear goggles and a dust mask when sawing it.

Buying a matching board or deciding whether an old fence is worth saving starts with knowing the wood. Cut a clean end on a spare picket and look for pores: none means a softwood such as pine, spruce, cedar or redwood; a ring of large pores means oak or another ring-porous hardwood. Cedar and redwood smell distinctive when freshly cut and are much lighter than pine. Our wood grain identification guide walks through the lens check.

WoodLens can name the likely species from a photo of a fresh cut or the weathered face, so you can check a fence and the replacement boards at the yard before you buy.

Fixr's cost guide, updated 31 January 2025, puts a 100 linear foot wood fence at $1,500 to $3,500 installed, and a national average project of about $4,500 for roughly 209 linear feet (about a quarter acre), with a typical range of $3,500 to $6,500. Labor runs $10 to $20 per linear foot, or $25 to $60 an hour.

Installed cost per linear foot by wood, from the same page:

• Pine (pressure-treated) - $10 to $25
• Cedar - $15 to $30
• Redwood - $25 to $40
• Black locust - $30 to $60

Style changes the total as much as the wood does: split rail $8 to $16, picket $10 to $18 and privacy $17 to $37 per linear foot installed. So a 100 ft privacy fence can cost more than twice a 100 ft picket fence in the same wood.

Strength in a fence comes from the posts and rails, and the USDA Wood Handbook (Table 5-3b, 12% moisture) shows how far apart the fence woods are:

• Black locust - bending strength 19,400 psi, side hardness 1,700 lbf, and in the "very resistant" decay group.
• Longleaf pine - 14,500 psi, 870 lbf; loblolly pine 12,800 psi, 690 lbf. Southern pine is the usual pressure-treated post.
• Coast Douglas-fir - 12,400 psi, 710 lbf.
• Redwood - 10,000 psi (old growth) and 7,900 psi (young growth), 480 and 420 lbf.
• Western redcedar - 7,500 psi, 350 lbf.

So the strongest wooden fencing is black locust or pressure-treated southern pine posts and rails. Cedar and redwood are chosen for stability, looks and natural decay resistance, not strength; they are good for boards and pickets on a stronger frame.