Door Swing and Door Handing Chart

What Door Handing Means

Door handing, or door swing, is a two-part description of a door: which side the hinges are on and which way the leaf swings. Both are judged from one agreed side of the opening, because the same door looks left-handed from one face and right-handed from the other.

Commercial door and hardware suppliers judge every door from the outside: the street side of an entry door, the corridor side of an office or classroom door, or the keyed side of any locked door. Schlage puts it plainly in its lever handing guide: the hand is the direction of swing viewed from the outside, or corridor side.

From that viewpoint there are only four single-door hands. Hinges on the left with the door swinging away from you is Left Hand (LH). Hinges on the right, swinging away, is Right Hand (RH). If the door swings toward you instead, add Reverse: Left Hand Reverse (LHR) and Right Hand Reverse (RHR). Lock catalogs also write these as LHRB and RHRB, for reverse bevel.

Door Handing Chart

Every hand seen from the outside or key side, with the name a residential exterior unit uses and the hand an interior prehung unit would carry if hung in the same opening.

The Handing Rule

Every handing chart reduces to two observations made from the outside: the hinge side gives the letter, the swing direction decides whether you add Reverse.

L / R

Side the hinges are on, seen from the outside or key side

H

Hand

R

Reverse: the door swings toward the outside viewer (outswing). Lock orders may write RB, reverse bevel

A

Active leaf of a pair, the leaf that carries the lock and opens first

Turn around and look from the other face and every hand changes: an LHR door seen from the inside is an RH door. That is why the viewpoint has to be fixed before anyone writes a hand on an order.

How to Determine the Hand of a Door

Pick the outside first, then read the hinges and the swing. Get the viewpoint right and the rest takes seconds.

• Exterior doors: stand outside the building, facing the door.
• Doors off a corridor: stand in the corridor. Hotel rooms, offices, classrooms and apartments are all handed from the hall.
• Doors with a lock but no clear inside or outside: stand on the keyed side, where the cylinder is.
• Interior passage doors with no lock: stand on the side the door swings away from (the push side). This gives the same answer as the residential method of standing in the opening with your back to the hinges.
• Now look at the hinges. Left or right gives LH or RH.
• Push the door. If it swings away from you, you are done. If you have to pull it toward you, add R for Reverse.

Residential vs Commercial Handing

Commercial door shops, frame makers and hardware distributors use the four outside-view hands on every opening. Trudoor states that the hand of a commercial door is always determined from the outside, and lock makers ship and label hardware the same way.

Residential suppliers usually split the question in two. Exterior units are ordered by hinge side seen from outside plus inswing or outswing, so LH becomes left-hand inswing and LHR becomes left-hand outswing. Interior prehung units have no outside, so they are named left or right hand only. The Reeb Learning Center method is to picture the door open and stand with your back to the hinges: if the open door is on your left, it is a left hand door.

The two systems agree on inswing doors and on any interior door judged from its push side. They part ways on outswing doors, and some retail sites go further and label outswing units by the lockset they need, which reverses the industry name. When an order leaves your hands, describe the door in words as well as letters.

How Handing Affects Doors, Locks and Closers

The hand matters most on parts that are machined or assembled for one side of the opening. Check each of these before you order.

• Prehung doors: the hinges are mortised into one jamb and the slab is bored on the other edge at the factory. A wrong-hand unit has to be rehung or returned, so confirm the hand on the rough opening before it ships.
• Steel frames and pre-machined slabs: hinge preps and strike preps are cut for one hand. Write the hand on the door schedule for each opening.
• Locksets and levers: many residential levers can be switched in the field, but they still have to be installed for the hand. Schlage notes that on a properly installed lever the end of the lever points toward the hinge side.
• Door closers: many modern surface closers, such as the LCN 4040XP, are non-handed. You still choose a regular arm on the pull side, or a top jamb or parallel arm on the push side, which depends on the swing.
• Exit devices: they mount on the push side of a door that swings out in the direction of egress, so seen from the outside those doors are almost always LHR or RHR.
• Garage entry doors: the IRC requires the door between an attached garage and the house to be self-closing (R302.5.1), so plan the closer or spring hinges with the swing.

Handing a Pair of Doors

A pair is handed by its active leaf, the one with the lockset that opens first. The inactive leaf is usually held by flush bolts at the top and bottom. Read the active leaf exactly as you would a single door, then add A.

Double Door Handing Chart

Pairs of doors, seen from the outside or key side.

Worked Example: Office Door off a Corridor

A 3-0 x 7-0 hollow metal door opens from a corridor into a small office. Standing in the corridor, the hinges are on your right and the door swings away from you into the office.

1. Viewpoint: the corridor is the outside, and it is also where the key cylinder goes.
2. Hinge side: right, so the letter is R.
3. Swing: away from you, so no Reverse. The hand is RH.
4. Lock: order an RH lever and check the lever end points toward the hinges after install.
5. Closer: a non-handed closer works either way. Use a regular arm on the office (pull) side or a parallel arm on the corridor (push) side.
6. Code: IBC 1010.1.2.1 only requires the door to swing in the direction of egress where the room holds 50 or more people, so an inswing door is fine for a small office.

Order an RH door, an RH frame and an RH lever, and write "hinges right from corridor, swings into office" on the order as a check.

Worked Example: Outswing Back Door onto a Deck

A homeowner wants the kitchen door to swing out onto the deck to save floor space. Standing on the deck, the hinges will be on your left and the door will swing toward you.

1. Viewpoint: the deck is the outside.
2. Hinge side: left, so the letter is L.
3. Swing: toward you, so add Reverse. The commercial hand is LHR.
4. Residential name: left-hand outswing. Check the supplier diagram, because some retail sites label outswing units by lockset and would call this right hand.
5. Landing: the deck can sit no more than 7-3/4" below the threshold, and a stair of two risers cannot start right at the door, because the door would swing over it (IRC R318.3.2, R311.3.2 in earlier editions).
6. Hardware: the hinge pins end up outside, so use non-removable pin or security hinges.

Order a left-hand outswing unit (LHR), confirm against the supplier diagram, and frame the deck landing before the door goes in.

Field Tips

Handing mistakes show up when the door arrives, not when it is ordered. These habits catch them early.

1. 1

   Hand from the key side, every time

   Most wrong-hand orders come from someone reading the door from the room side. Decide the outside first, and write it on the schedule next to the hand.

2. 2

   Put the hand in words on the order

   Some retailers label outswing doors by the lockset they need, so their left-hand outswing is the industry right-hand outswing. Add "hinges left from outside, swings out" next to the code.

3. 3

   Check the lever before you tighten it

   On a Schlage lever, the end of the lever should point toward the hinge side. If it points at the latch edge, the lever is installed for the wrong hand.

4. 4

   Mind the landing on outswing doors

   At the required egress door, the IRC allows the outside landing up to 7-3/4" below the threshold only when the door does not swing over it. An outswing door needs the landing within 1-1/2" (R318.3.1).

5. 5

   Count the occupants before you swing a door in

   Under IBC 1010.1.2.1, a side-hinged door serving a room or area with 50 or more occupants must swing in the direction of egress. That turns many meeting room doors into reverse hands.

Sources: Schlage lever handing guide, The Natural Handyman: door hand Q&A, IRC Chapter 3, Building Planning, IBC Chapter 10, Means of Egress