Quick answer
A walk-in pantry earns its floor area at roughly 1.5m² or more, where you can fit U-shaped shelving, a bench, and walk-in access; below that, a tall cabinet pantry stores more per square metre. In Auckland, MTN Kitchens specs walk-ins with 300–400mm shelves, a powered bench, and ventilation.
Everyone wants a walk-in pantry until they see what it costs them in floor area. On an Auckland plan, a decent walk-in eats 1.8 to 2.5 square metres of conditioned floor space, and that space isn't free — it comes off your living room, your dining, or the second bathroom you were arguing about. We build and install ten-plus kitchens a week out of our East Tamaki workshop, and the pantry is the single most over-asked-for and under-thought-out part of the brief. People copy what they saw on a show home and never check whether the shape, the door, or the shelving actually works for how they cook.
Floor area is the real price
A walk-in pantry done right is a genuinely good room. Done wrong, it's a dark cupboard you walk into, can't find anything in, and stub your toe in the corner you can't reach. The difference is rarely budget. It's planning — door swing, shelf depth, where the bench sits, whether you ran power in before the GIB went up. This guide is the version we'd give a client over the bench before they signed off the plan: when a walk-in earns its footprint, when a tall cabinet pantry beats it outright, and how to detail the thing so it works for 20 years.
Key points
- A walk-in needs roughly 1.8-2.5m2 of floor plus a door swing — a tall cabinet pantry stores nearly as much in 0.6m2 against a wall.
- Shelves should taper: 400-450mm deep down low for appliances and bulk, 250-300mm up top so tins don't hide behind tins.
- If you want it to work as a scullery, run a 20A circuit and ducted extraction in before lining — retrofitting both is dear and ugly.
- A 1.0-1.2m clear floor between facing shelf runs is the minimum that two people and an open door can share.
- Below about 1.5m of usable wall run, a walk-in rarely beats a 600mm tall pantry on storage-per-dollar.
Walk-in versus cabinet pantry: what each actually buys you
A cabinet pantry is joinery — a 600mm-wide tall unit, usually 2.1 to 2.4m high, full of shelves or pull-outs, sitting flush in the run. A walk-in is a small room you step into, lined and shelved on two or three walls. People treat them as a straight upgrade, walk-in being the better one. They're not the same product and they don't solve the same problem.
Storage-per-dollar, the cabinet pantry wins more often than people expect. A good 600mm tall pantry with internal drawers or pull-out wire baskets holds a startling amount, every item is visible when you open it, and it costs you 0.6m2 of wall — no floor, no door swing, no lining, no light fitting. A walk-in only pulls ahead once you've got real wall run inside it, three sides of shelving, and a use case that wants a bench: bulk shopping, a chest freezer, small appliances living out permanently, a coffee station, overflow crockery.
The honest test is usable shelf metres, not floor area. A 1.8m2 walk-in with shelving on one wall and a door eating the opposite corner can carry less than two 600mm tall pantries side by side — and it cost you the floor as well. If you can't get an L or U of shelving in, you've built a cupboard you have to walk into, which is the worst of both. We'll often steer a client back to a pair of tall cabinets plus more bench, and they thank us for it later. If your footprint is genuinely tight, read Designing a Small Kitchen That Feels Bigger before you commit a room to a pantry.
| Factor | Cabinet pantry (600mm) | Walk-in pantry |
|---|---|---|
| Floor taken | None — sits in the run | 1.8-2.5m2 plus door swing |
| Usable shelf run | ~3-4 lineal m in pull-outs | 4-8 lineal m if L or U shaped |
| Visibility | Everything visible on opening | Back corners hide stock |
| Power/extraction | Not usually needed | Worth it if used as scullery |
| Best for | Standard homes, tight plans | Bulk buyers, big households, scullery use |
Sizing it so it actually works
The number that kills most walk-ins is the clear floor between facing shelves. People draw shelving on both walls of a 1.2m-wide room, forget the shelves are 350mm deep each, and end up with 500mm of standing room — you can't turn around with the door open, let alone share it. Shelves take their depth off the floor on both sides. Plan the clear gap, not the wall-to-wall.
The dimensions that matter
For a single-sided walk-in (shelves one wall, clear the other), 900mm internal width is workable and 1.0m is comfortable. For double-sided or U-shaped, you want 1.0 to 1.2m of clear floor between the shelf fronts — that's two people and an open door. Depth-wise, 1.5 to 2.0m deep is the sweet spot; go much deeper and the back becomes a no-go zone you forget exists. Door opening 760mm minimum, 810mm if you ever want a bin or a vac in there on wheels.
- Single-sided: 900-1000mm internal width, shelving 300-400mm deep one wall.
- Double/U-sided: 1000-1200mm clear floor between shelf fronts.
- Depth 1.5-2.0m — deeper buys dead back corners, not storage.
- Door 760-810mm; a cavity slider saves the swing if floor is tight.
- Min ~1.5m of usable wall run inside, or a tall cabinet beats it.
On door type: a hinged door swings into either the pantry or the kitchen, and both cost you. A cavity slider is the move when floor is tight — no swing, and you can leave it open without a door blocking a bench or walkway. Just remember a cavity slider needs the wall thickness for the pocket, which is a framing decision made well before lining, not a joinery one.
Shelving: depth, height and the taper that makes it usable
The single best thing you can do for a walk-in is taper the shelf depth top to bottom. Deep down low, shallow up high. Down at the base, 400-450mm deep takes small appliances, bulk packs, the slow cooker, boxes. Mid-height, 300-350mm for everyday groceries. Up top, 250-300mm so a back row of tins isn't permanently hidden behind a front row. A wall of uniform 400mm shelves looks tidy on a plan and is hopeless in use — everything at the back disappears.
Adjustable beats fixed, every time. Tastes and stock change; a teenager's appetite changes; today's air fryer is tomorrow's bench-top bread maker. Twin-slot standards or a drilled system let you move shelves on a 30-40mm pitch. Set initial spacing around 300-350mm for general shelves, one tall 400mm-plus zone down low for appliances and tall bottles, and leave the bottom open to the floor for a bin, a crate, or the chest freezer. Melteca or melamine shelving on a robust edge is the workhorse here — it wipes clean and doesn't sag if you support it properly. For the wider thinking on what storage actually gets used versus what looks good in a brochure, Kitchen Storage Solutions That Actually Get Used is worth a read alongside this.
Support the span or it'll bow
Melamine and melteca shelving sags over long unsupported spans, especially loaded with tins and bottles. Keep spans under about 800mm between supports for an 18mm board, or step up board thickness and add a front edge rail. We see bowed pantry shelves on cheap fit-outs constantly — it's always span, not material. Either bracket it properly or break the run with a divider.
The pantry with a bench: when it becomes a scullery
Add a benchtop and you've changed the brief. A walk-in with a run of bench is halfway to a scullery or butler's pantry, and that's where these earn their keep in a busy Auckland household — appliances live out and stay plugged in, the mess of prep and dishes happens behind a wall, and the main kitchen stays presentable. If you're entertaining or running an open-plan living space, that hidden second bench is the whole point.
But a bench needs depth and services. A working bench wants 600mm depth, which means your room has to be wide enough for 600mm of bench plus 900-1000mm of clear standing room plus whatever's on the opposite wall. That's a 1.5m-plus wide room, minimum, before the bench earns its place. Skinny benches under 450mm look the part and are useless for actual prep. And a bench you'll use means power — for the kettle, the toaster, the coffee machine, maybe a second sink. Which brings us to the part people forget until it's too late.
Power and ventilation: decide before the GIB goes up
The numbers a walk-in must hit
This is the one that bites. If there's any chance the pantry holds appliances that run — a microwave, a second fridge or chest freezer, a coffee machine, a kettle that lives in there — you want power roughed in before the walls are lined. Retrofitting a circuit into a finished, shelved pantry means cutting GIB, chasing the wall, patching and repainting. It's dear and it never looks as clean. Cheap insurance: get your electrician to run a 20A circuit with two or three double outlets to the pantry while the framing's still open.
Ventilation matters more than people think. A closed pantry with a fridge or freezer in it builds heat — the appliance dumps warmth, the room has no airflow, and the compressor works harder and dies younger. If it's a true scullery with a cooktop or anything that produces steam, you're into real extraction — ducted to outside, sized for the load, the same logic as the main kitchen rangehood. Don't recirculate steam back into a small sealed room. Our piece on ducted versus recirculating rangehoods covers why ducting out matters, and it applies double in a confined pantry.
- Appliances that run: 20A circuit, 2-3 double outlets, roughed in pre-line.
- Fridge/freezer inside: leave airflow — a vent or a gap, never fully sealed.
- Cooktop or steam: ducted extraction to outside, sized for the load.
- Lighting: switched at the door, on a sensor if you want hands-free.
- Data/charging: a USB outlet if it doubles as a drop zone or charging shelf.
Lighting you'll actually see by
A single dim bulb in the middle of the ceiling throws shadows onto exactly the shelves you're trying to read. Put the light where you're looking. A door-switched or sensor LED that comes on as you step in, plus a strip down one side if it's deep, beats a centre fitting every time. It's a small spend that makes the room feel twice as usable. The same task-versus-ambient thinking from Kitchen Lighting: Task, Ambient and Under-Cabinet applies — light the shelf faces, not the ceiling.
A worked Auckland scenario
Take a new build in Flat Bush, four-bed, open-plan living, a couple who bulk-shop at Costco and entertain most weekends. The plans show a 1.4m by 1.6m walk-in off the kitchen — about 2.2m2 — with a hinged door swinging into the kitchen. Looks generous on paper. In practice the door swing fouls the fridge, and the room's just shy of taking a working bench.
What we'd do: swap the hinged door for an 810mm cavity slider — kills the swing problem and lets them leave it open. Run shelving in an L down the long wall and the back, tapered 450mm at the base to 250mm up top, adjustable on twin-slot. Drop a 600mm bench along the remaining short wall for the coffee machine, the air fryer and the toaster, with a 20A circuit and three doubles roughed in before lining. Add a vent high on the external wall because a spare fridge is going in the base. Sensor LED at the door. That's a walk-in earning its 2.2m2 — bulk storage, hidden appliances, a working second bench, and the main kitchen stays clean. If they hadn't had the bulk-buy habit and the entertaining, we'd have told them to drop the room, take two 600mm tall pantries in the run, and gain a metre of living space.
Half the walk-ins I measure up, the owner would've been better off with two tall cabinets and the floor back. The other half, it's the best room in the house. The difference is whether they actually use a bench in there — and whether anyone ran power in before the linings went on.
When a tall cabinet pantry simply wins
There's no shame in not having a walk-in. For a lot of Auckland homes — terraced housing, apartments, compact spec homes, anything where floor area is the constraint — a tall cabinet pantry is the smarter call, full stop. A 600mm or 900mm tall unit with internal drawers gives you visible, reachable storage without surrendering a room. Two of them side by side will out-store a mediocre walk-in and leave you a lounge.
The rule of thumb we use: if you can't fit at least 1.5m of usable wall run inside the walk-in, or you can't get an L or U of shelving in, build cabinets instead. And if the only reason you want a walk-in is that the neighbour's place had one, that's not a reason — it's a floor-area decision dressed up as a feature. For townhouses and developments specifically, where every square metre is costed, Standard Kitchen Sizes and Layouts for NZ Townhouse Developments shows why the cabinet pantry usually wins the feasibility argument.
Where the walk-in genuinely earns it: big households, bulk shoppers, people who entertain and want a scullery, homes with the floor to spare. In those cases it's not an indulgence, it's the right tool. Just build it properly — taper the shelves, plan the clear floor, run the services before lining — so it works as well in year ten as it did on handover day.
Frequently asked questions
How big does a walk-in pantry need to be?
Minimum useful is around 1.8m2, but width matters more than area. Allow 900-1000mm clear floor for single-sided shelving, or 1.0-1.2m between shelf fronts if you shelve two walls. Below about 1.5m of usable wall run inside, a tall cabinet pantry generally stores more for less.
Walk-in or cabinet pantry — which stores more?
Often the cabinet pantry, surprisingly. A 600mm tall unit with pull-outs holds a lot and every item is visible. A walk-in only pulls ahead once it's L or U shaped with real wall run, and it costs you floor and a door swing the cabinet doesn't.
Do I need power in a walk-in pantry?
Only if appliances will run in there — a microwave, second fridge, coffee machine, chest freezer. If so, rough in a 20A circuit before the walls are lined. Retrofitting power into a finished, shelved pantry means cutting and patching GIB, which is dear and rarely looks clean.
How deep should pantry shelves be?
Taper them. Around 400-450mm deep at the base for appliances and bulk, 300-350mm at mid-height, and 250-300mm up top so back rows aren't hidden. Uniform deep shelving wastes the back third of every shelf on stuff you can't see or reach.
What's the difference between a walk-in pantry and a scullery?
A walk-in is shelved storage you step into. A scullery adds a working bench, often a sink, power and extraction — a hidden second prep-and-dishes zone. The scullery is a bigger build with plumbing and electrical scope, so decide which you're building before you price it.
Does a walk-in pantry add resale value?
It can in the right home — buyers like them and they show well. But a badly planned, dark, hard-to-reach walk-in can read as wasted floor. A clean, well-lit cabinet pantry plus more living space often appeals more in compact homes. It depends on the house and the buyer.
If you're weighing a walk-in against tall cabinets on a plan — residential, a spec build, or a development where every square metre is costed — send us the layout and we'll tell you straight which one earns its footprint. We supply and install on one contract, one invoice, trade pricing with no showroom markup, and we'll have a quote back to you within 24 hours. Send through your kitchen plans or your unit count and we'll get the pantry detail right before anything gets built.