How to Remove Kitchen Cabinets

Do you need to know how to remove kitchen cabinets? As fun as popular DIY shows on TV make it look, people don’t usually use sledgehammers to do so.

Whether you want to keep the old cabinets for future use in the garage or laundry room, I’ll show you how to remove them intact or taking them apart.

I’ll show you the best way to remove your cabinets with the least damage to the rest of your kitchen. Let’s dive in.

Protect Yourself, First and Foremost

Kitchen cabinets are heavy. Even the lightest cabinet is unwieldy and may suddenly come off the wall without any real warning. Before you begin removing the cabinet, it is crucial to take some precautions and know your limits.

This is not a solo project, especially for heavy overhead cabinets that might fall and cause injury. Since failing to prepare is preparing to fail, here are some preparation tips:

• Get a work buddy. Decide who is doing what before you get started, assigning tasks based on strengths and preferences
• Remove all breakable items from the entire area and then empty all cabinets.
• Please remove all pets, small children, whiny teens, and anyone who cannot help.
• Tools needed – utility knife, electric tester, adjustable wrench, pry bar, reciprocating saw, cordless drill with square, star, or phillip bits, (depending on the screws used on your cabinets).
• Put down a drop cloth to protect as much of the area as possible.

Uninstall Plumbing

The first thing you need to do is turn off the water underneath your sink. Sometimes, the hot water valve gets stuck. Don’t force it or you might break off the oval part of the valve.

If it doesn’t turn, you’ll need to turn off the water to the entire house and change out the valve. If you don’t feel comfortable doing this, call a plumber.

Once your water is turned off, place a bucket underneath to catch the water when you unscrew the water lines. You can also use the bucket to catch the water in the drain trap. If you have a dishwasher, unscrew that water line and drain it as well.

Now, you can remove the sink if it is top-mounted (installed over the countertop). The sink will be screwed to the countertop underneath. Loosen and remove those, then take your prybar to separate the sink from the countertop.

Demo Countertop

If you have a granite or other type of solid stone countertop, I highly recommend you get a professional to demo it and take it away. They are extremely heavy and will take several people to lift.

If you have enough people to lift them safely, they are usually epoxied to the top of the cabinets or have a plywood layer underneath. You must separate the epoxy from the cabinets and wherever a seam is in the countertop.

You can do this with heat and an oscillating tool. Once the epoxy is soft, pry it up and wedge a wood shim in between it and the cabinets. This will give you somewhere to grip the stone to remove it from the cabinets.

You can try to break them up, but you will have flying shards everywhere to clean up.

If you have laminate or wood countertops, these are quickly demolished and easy enough to remove with two people. These countertops are screwed from underneath around the front and back of the cabinets.

Unscrew all the screws, then use a prybar between the counter and cabinet to lift the laminate off. To avoid damaging your wall, use a utility knife to cut through the layer of caulk all around the edges.

Cutting them down with the reciprocating saw will make removing them easier if you have large sections.

If you have an older tile countertop, you must break up the tile and then remove the plywood or backerboard underneath. These will also be screwed to the cabinets from underneath.

Removing Cabinets

If you want to avoid damaging the kitchen cabinets, the demo will take longer than if you break them up.

80% of kitchen cabinets are screwed through their back to wood studs behind drywall walls.

If the connection is not immediately obvious, you may have some trouble, but most screws are at the top and bottom of the back of cabinets. Most wood studs are centered 16 inches apart.

You can guesstimate the locations of the other screws after you find the first one.

1. The first thing to do is remove all doors, hinges, shelves, and drawers. Most hinges are screwed to the face frame of the cabinet. This will make the cabinet frames lighter and easier to remove.
2. The second thing to do is take your utility knife and cut through the bead of caulk used on the back side of the cabinet against the wall and wherever the cabinet and wall meet. This will limit the amount of damage to your wall.
3. Demo lower base cabinets first.
4. Assess whether you have one long cabinet (an older kitchen) or several cabinets secured together through the face frame. If several screwed together, remove all screws that you can find.
5. If the cabinet is easily movable, simply remove it. After removing it from the other cabinets and the wall, you can easily take it apart for transport to the dump.
6. If the upper cabinets aren’t one whole unit, they will be removed like the base cabinets.
7. If the upper or lower cabinet is one unit, it can be taken apart if it’s too heavy to remove as one unit. Do not unscrew it from the wall if you decide to take it apart.
8. Use a pry bar or hammer to remove the face frame from the cabinet. It is holding much of the cabinet together.
9. Next, on base cabinets, hammer the sides of the cabinet until it starts to tilt sideways and is loose enough to grab and take off.
10. On upper cabinets, hammer the bottom of the cabinet unit till it tilts downwards and is easily removable.
11. You should be left with the back panel that is still screwed to the wall. Unscrew it, and it should come right off.
12. Remove drawers for the same reason as doors.
13. Once you start feeling the cabinet move, ensure you can support the weight with another person.

In some older kitchens, the cabinets might have been installed using adhesives, as well as screws, which means that you will have to pry them from the wall.

This also means it is highly unlikely that you are going to remove the cabinets without some damage to them and the wall.

Repairing Walls Before New Cabinets

Now that you’ve successfully removed the cabinets. How much repair work will you do before installing the new cabinets? That will depend on a few factors.

• Where are the new cabinets going?
• Will the damage show once the cabinets are in place?
• Are you installing a backsplash between the upper and lower cabinets?

If you replace the new kitchen cabinets in their exact location, you’ll only need to make minimal, functional repairs. If the cabinets are moving, you’ll need to repair anything that will be seen.

This may mean something as simple as filling in some holes or major drywall repair and painting.

If you had a 4-inch-tall backsplash, I’m sure your walls were damaged from getting those out. If it’s minor, don’t worry about it if you’re installing another backsplash.

A Final Note of Caution

Some cabinets can hide wiring, such as those above built-in microwaves or a hard-wired dishwasher in older kitchens.

If you can’t see where the wiring runs and where it starts and ends, don’t try to remove that cabinet without shutting the power off to that area.

Use a tester to determine if the line is live, and have your buddy turn off breakers until you find the correct one. You don’t want to start prying a cabinet and end up slicing into a live wire.

Taking your time and being careful of exposed screws, nails, electrical wires, and plumbing will help you be successful in this project. The added satisfaction of knowing that you did this on your own is more than enough of a reward.