Crusher Run vs River Rock: Size, Cost, and Which to Use

Crusher Run

Crusher run is crushed stone with the rock dust left in, sold as 3/4 inch minus or 1.5 inch minus. It costs $20 to $35 per ton in 2026, weighs 1.5 to 1.7 tons per cubic yard, and packs into a surface hard enough to drive on year after year. It is the standard base under roads, driveways, parking lots, and patios, and the best single-layer material for a gravel driveway. In the Southeast it is called crush and run. Highway departments call it aggregate base course, ABC, or Class 5.

River Rock

River rock is naturally rounded stone from river beds and glacial gravel deposits, washed and screened into size bands from 3/4 inch to 8 inches. It costs $40 to $100 per ton in 2026, weighs 1.35 to 1.6 tons per cubic yard, and is the go-to decorative stone for dry creek beds, garden beds, borders, and drainage swales where the rock needs to look good and stay put. It costs two to three times what crushed stone costs because it is sorted and washed, and because the supply is limited to places with river gravel.

Crusher Run

• ✓ Driveways
• ✓ Parking areas
• ✓ Road base
• ✓ Paver base
• ✓ Walkways
• ✓ Shed and equipment pads

River Rock

• ✓ Landscaping
• ✓ Dry creek beds
• ✓ Decorative borders
• ✓ Drainage swales
• ✓ Water features
• ✓ Ground cover

Crusher Run

• + Packs into a hard, drivable surface
• + Cheapest processed stone at $20 to $35 per ton
• + One layer does the whole driveway on firm ground
• + Grades smooth and repairs easily
• + Stocked at every quarry

• − Does not drain, sheds water instead
• − Dusty when dry, muddy when wet before it seals
• − Dense, so a ton covers less area than clean stone
• − Wrong choice for any drainage use
• − Plain gray look

River Rock

• + Best-looking bulk stone, natural mixed colors
• + Never decomposes, one-time install
• + Drains fast and rarely clogs
• + Large sizes stay put in moving water
• + Available in sizes from 3/4 inch to 8 inch cobbles

• − Expensive, $40 to $100 per ton
• − Never packs, so it is a poor surface to walk or drive on
• − Heavy and awkward to spread
• − Holds heat in full sun
• − Hard to clean leaves and debris out of

Crusher Run

Crusher run is everything that comes off the crusher below a set size, usually 3/4 inch minus or 1.5 inch minus: angular stone at the top of the range down to sand and rock dust. Roughly a third of the mix is fines. Color matches the quarry rock, typically gray limestone or gray to tan granite, and it lightens as the dust dries.

River Rock

River rock is sold by size band: 3/4 to 1 inch (sometimes called large pea gravel), 1 to 2 inch (egg rock), 2 to 3 inch, 3 to 5 inch, and 5 to 8 inch cobbles. Every piece is smooth and rounded. Colors are a natural mix of tan, brown, gray, cream, rust, and black, with regional loads that run mostly one shade. Single-color sorted rock costs more.