KITCHEN GUIDE
Fitting Kitchen Handles and Knobs Without Chipping the Door
Your doors arrive undrilled, so handle position is yours to choose — and yours to get right first time. This guide covers measuring centres, where handles conventionally sit, and how to drill a gloss door without breaking out the face.
Get this right before you drill anything
A hole in the wrong place on a new door cannot be undone. Everything below is about not needing a second door.
New doors arrive undrilled. That is deliberate — handle position is a matter of taste and of what suits the door, and a factory hole in the wrong spot would be worse than no hole at all.
It does mean the drilling is on you, and it is the one job in a door swap with no margin for error. Take the extra twenty minutes.
Measuring the handle you have bought
Find the centres, not the length
The number that matters on a bar or pull handle is the centre distance — the distance between the middles of the two fixing holes, not the overall length of the handle. Overall length is always bigger, and drilling to it will leave you with two holes the handle cannot reach.
Measure it from the back of the handle, centre of one post to centre of the other, in millimetres.
Check the bolt length against your door
Handles come with machine bolts, usually M4. The bolt has to pass through the door and still have enough thread left to bite. Doors vary in thickness between ranges, so hold a bolt against the edge of your new door before you commit — a bolt that is too long stands proud inside the cupboard and catches on everything; too short and it will not hold.
Knobs need one hole, and one decision
A knob is a single fixing, so there is no centre distance to worry about — but there is no second hole to average out an error either. Whatever position you choose, use the same jig for every knob in the kitchen so they line up across the run.
Where handles conventionally go
There is no rule, but there are conventions, and following them is why a kitchen looks deliberate rather than accidental.
- Base unit doors
- Handle near the TOP of the door, on the opening edge — the corner furthest from the hinges.
- Wall unit doors
- Handle near the BOTTOM of the door, on the opening edge. Doors are reached from below, so the handle comes to the hand.
- Drawer fronts
- Centred left to right, and centred top to bottom on the front. On deep pan drawers some fitters set it slightly high — pick one and apply it to every drawer.
- Bar handles on drawers
- Usually horizontal and centred. On tall doors they are usually vertical.
- Inset from the door edge
- Commonly 40–70mm from the edge to the handle centre. The exact figure matters far less than using the SAME figure everywhere.
Marking and drilling
Make a template rather than measuring each door
Cut a piece of scrap board or stiff card with two edges that register against the corner of a door, and drill your hole positions through it. Now every door is marked from the same template instead of from a fresh tape measurement — which is where the variation creeps in.
Purpose-made handle jigs do the same job and are worth it if you have a lot of doors.
Mark with a centre punch or bradawl
A drill bit will wander on a smooth foil or gloss surface and take the finish with it. Punch a small dimple at each centre first so the bit has somewhere to start.
Back the door with scrap before you drill
Breakout happens where the bit exits. Clamp a piece of scrap timber tight against the BACK of the door and drill through the face into it — the scrap supports the fibres at the exit and you get a clean hole on both sides.
Drill from the face, at a steady speed
Always drill from the decorative face, so that if there is any tear-out it is on the inside where nobody sees it. Keep the drill square to the door — use a drill guide or, at minimum, sight it against an engineer's square.
Tighten by hand, not with a driver
Handle bolts thread into a soft-ish board core and are easy to over-tighten. Nip them up with a screwdriver by hand until the handle is firm and stops. A power driver will strip the hole or dish the face around the fixing before you feel it happen.
Frequently asked questions
Do your kitchen doors come pre-drilled for handles?
No. Doors are supplied undrilled so you can choose your own handle and position. We do offer hinge hole drilling as a separate service on door orders, but handle holes are always drilled on site.
What size drill bit do I need for handle bolts?
Handle bolts are commonly M4, which needs a hole a little over 4mm so the bolt passes freely — a 5mm bit is the usual choice. Check the bolts that came with your handles and test on a piece of scrap or an old door before drilling a new one.
Can I reuse my old handles on new doors?
Often yes, provided the centre distance suits the new door and the bolts are long enough for its thickness. Measure the centres on the old handle and check the bolt length against your new door — do not assume the old bolts will fit a door of a different thickness.
My handle bolts are too long. What do I do?
Shorter bolts are widely available and are the clean answer. Bolts can also be shortened with a hacksaw — run a nut onto the thread first and remove it afterwards, which cleans the thread as it comes off. Do not pack the handle out to take up the extra length; it leaves the handle standing away from the door.
Which way round do handles go on a corner cupboard?
Handle on the opening edge as normal, but open both doors fully before you drill. In a corner, a handle on the wrong edge will strike the adjacent door or the worktop return. Dry-fit and swing the doors first — this is the one position worth checking physically rather than on paper.
Do I need handles at all?
Not on a true handleless range — Ora, for instance, uses a J-profile that you pull on directly, and end panels are supplied with a matching profile so the detail runs through. On every other range a handle or knob is what you open the door by.
Not sure your handles will suit the door?
Tell us the range and the handle and we will tell you whether the bolts and centres work.