Augusta Concrete Patios pours stamped concrete patios, concrete driveways, walkways, steps and pool decks across Augusta and the CSRA. Free on-site quote, usually within two working days.
Augusta Concrete Patios is a concrete contractor working residential and light commercial flatwork across Augusta. Everything below is quoted free on site, and every quote states the slab thickness, the base depth and the mix, so you can hold it next to another contractor's and compare like with like.
Under nearly every lot in Richmond County is red clay, which swells wet and shrinks dry by several percent between a saturated spring and a dry August. A slab poured straight onto it has to follow that movement and breaks, usually within two to four years. Ours go down at 4 inches and 4,000 psi over 4 to 6 inches of compacted crushed stone that spreads the load and drains.
$6–$15 per square foot for a broom finish, $12–$20 stamped
A driveway on Georgia clay lives or dies on its base. We compact the subgrade, lay 4 to 6 inches of crushed stone, then pour 4 inches at 4,000 psi, or 5 to 6 where a truck parks. Downspouts get extended away from the edge, because clay kept permanently wet at one point while the rest dries is what cracks slabs here.
$6–$10 per square foot plain, $10–$18 stamped
Walkways run 3 to 4 inches thick and 36 to 48 inches wide, which is enough for two people abreast. Control joints go in at spacing equal to the width so panels stay square. A broom finish across the direction of travel gives grip when wet, and the fall away from the house should be about 1/4 inch per foot so water never sits against the foundation.
$6–$12 per square foot
Pool decking needs slip resistance and cool feet before it needs looks. Salt finish and broom finish both give texture; smooth trowel is unsafe wet. Light colours run noticeably cooler underfoot in summer than dark. The deck slopes away from the coping at about 1/4 inch per foot, and expansion joints separate it from the pool shell so the two move independently.
$9–$18 per square foot
Steps are the most code-driven concrete on a property: risers between 4 and 7¾ inches, treads at least 10 inches, and the variation across a flight held under 3/8 inch or they feel wrong and fail inspection. They are formed and poured monolithically with the landing where possible, because a cold joint at the base of a step is where water gets in and freeze damage starts.
$200–$450 per step
Every page carries the same detail and a real price for this market.
A texture mat pressed into the slab while it is still plastic, with a release powder that leaves secondary colour in the joints. Timing is everything, too early and the mat sinks, too late and it will not register. Integral colour goes in the mix at the truck, so the tone runs right through the slab rather than sitting on the surface.
$12–$20 per square foot
The cement paste is washed back from the surface to reveal the stone in the mix, either with a surface retarder sprayed on and rinsed the next day, or by washing while green. The look is decided at the batch plant by the aggregate you specify. It is the most slip-resistant decorative finish and the most forgiving of dirt.
$8–$14 per square foot
Acid stain reacts chemically with free lime in the cement and gives mottled, translucent, unrepeatable colour that will not peel because it is a reaction rather than a coating. Water-based stains offer a wider palette but sit more on the surface. Either way the slab must be clean and uncoated, and the result is sealed afterwards.
$3–$8 per square foot over an existing slab
Integral colour is dosed into the mix at the plant so the pigment runs through the full depth, a chip or a saw cut still shows colour. Dry-shake hardener puts stronger colour and a tougher wearing surface on the top 1/8 inch. Integral is more forgiving over decades; dry-shake gives more intense tones on day one.
adds $1–$3 per square foot
The standard textured finish: the slab is floated smooth, then dragged with a broom to raise fine parallel lines that give grip. Drawn across the direction of travel it is the most slip-resistant plain finish and by far the cheapest. It hides minor imperfection well, which is exactly why it is the default on driveways and public walks.
no premium over plain
Every page carries the same detail and a real price for this market.
The most ordered pattern in residential work: irregular rectangular blocks in a slate texture, usually on a 24 to 36 inch mat. It reads as natural stone from standing height and hides the seams between mats better than any geometric pattern. Joint layout is planned before the pour so saw cuts can follow grout lines rather than cross them.
$12–$20 per square foot
Large flexible skins with no repeating joint, pressed into the surface to give texture without any visible pattern. The result reads as weathered stone or aged concrete rather than as an imitation of pavers. It is the most forgiving choice on irregular shapes and curves, where a rigid mat pattern would have to be cut and would show it.
$12–$20 per square foot
Plank mats with real grain and knot detail, laid in a running bond and hand-coloured board by board so no two planks match. Done properly it is convincing from a few feet away and lasts decades outdoors where a real timber deck would need replacing. The colour work, not the stamping, is what separates a good job from an obvious one.
$12–$20 per square foot
A repeating fan or running pattern of small rounded stones, at its best on driveways and courtyards where the scale suits. The tight joint spacing means release colour does most of the work, and the pattern reads well from a car as well as on foot. It is more forgiving of slight surface variation than large-format slate.
$12–$20 per square foot
Brick-sized units at 45 degrees in the classic herringbone. It is the most demanding pattern to set out, because the diagonal makes any drift from square obvious along an edge, so the starting line is snapped and checked before the first mat goes down. Best on rectangular areas with a defined border to close the cut edges.
$12–$20 per square foot
In Augusta the first question is whether the clay underneath moved. A hairline along a control joint is normal curing. A crack that wanders diagonally from a corner, or where one side has dropped, means the subgrade shifted, usually clay that stayed wet by a downspout while the rest shrank. Sealing the surface without fixing the drainage just reopens next summer.
$6–$18 per linear foot
A bonded overlay over a slab that is structurally sound but ugly, spalled, discoloured or worn. It costs a fraction of replacement and can carry stamping or colour. The test is simple: if the slab is cracked because the base failed, resurfacing buys a year or two at most. If it is only the surface that has gone, it buys decades.
$4–$10 per square foot
Georgia humidity and heavy summer rain make sealing worth more here than in a dry climate, particularly on stamped work where the release colour sits near the surface. Penetrating silane and siloxane sealers soak in without a film to peel; acrylics give the wet look on decorative slabs and want reapplying every 2 to 3 years.
$1–$2.50 per square foot
Polyurethane foam is injected through 5/8 inch holes under a settled slab and expands to lift it back to grade, usually within an hour and at a fraction of replacement cost. It works when the slab itself is sound and only the support beneath it washed out or compacted. A slab that is broken into several pieces is past lifting.
$4–$11 per square foot, well under replacement
Removal, base rebuild and repour. The old slab comes out, the subgrade gets recompacted, and 4 to 6 inches of crushed stone goes back before any concrete is ordered. Replacing the slab without rebuilding the base is how a brand new driveway cracks in three years, and it is the corner most commonly cut on a low quote.
$8–$14 per square foot including removal
Every page carries the same detail and a real price for this market.
Augusta sits on the Georgia Piedmont, and the subgrade under almost every property here is red clay. Clay is not inert. It takes on water and swells, it dries out and shrinks, and it does that through every wet spring and dry August. A slab poured straight onto clay rides that movement, and concrete has no give in it.
The answer is the stone base, and it is why we will not quote a job without one. Four to six inches of compacted crushed stone does two jobs: it spreads the load so no single spot on the clay carries the slab, and it drains, so water moves away instead of sitting in the clay directly beneath the concrete. Skipping it is the single most common reason slabs in the CSRA crack in a straight line across the middle within a few years.
The second local factor is heat. Concrete sets by chemical reaction, and that reaction runs faster the hotter it is. On a 95-degree Augusta afternoon a slab can go from workable to unworkable in under an hour, which is how you end up with cold joints, surface crazing and a finish that never closed properly. Summer pours here start early, and the slab gets covered and kept damp while it cures rather than being left to bake.
The concrete underneath is the same. What changes is the surface, and it is worth seeing them side by side before deciding, the difference in price between them is small against the difference in how the finished job looks.
A texture pressed into the surface while the slab is still plastic.
Stone brought to the surface by washing back the cement paste.
The standard textured finish, drawn with a broom across the float.
Rock salt pressed in then washed out, leaving small pits.
Colour driven into cured concrete rather than mixed in.
Pigment batched into the mix at the plant.
Subgrade. Topsoil comes off. It is organic, it compresses, and anything built on it will settle. The exposed subgrade gets compacted in layers rather than in one pass, because a plate compactor only influences a few inches at a time.
Stone base. Four to six inches of compacted crushed stone over the clay subgrade. The base spreads load and, just as importantly. It drains. Skipping it is the most common way a slab that looks perfect in year one is broken by year five.
Forms and fall. Set to shed water away from the structure. A dead-level slab holds standing water, and standing water in January is how surfaces come apart.
Reinforcement. Fibre through the mix for patios, and for driveways #4 reinforcing bar at eighteen inches on centre, chaired up into the slab rather than laid on the ground where it does nothing.
The pour. Continuous. A patio poured across two days has a cold joint through it, and on stamped work that line never goes away.
Finishing. On the concrete's schedule, not ours. Float too early and you seal bleed water into the surface, which is what makes concrete dust and flake later. Float too late and it will not close at all. Reading that window is judgement, and it is most of what a good crew is worth.
Control joints. Cut about a quarter of the slab depth, spaced in feet at roughly two to three times the thickness in inches, eight to twelve feet on a four-inch slab. Joints do not prevent cracking. They choose where it happens, and a crack inside a joint is a crack nobody ever sees.
Curing. Concrete gains strength through hydration, not by drying. Keeping moisture in during the first days matters more than anything that happens to it afterwards.
We handle sidewalks, ADA curb ramps, parking areas, dumpster pads and loading dock aprons for property managers and associations across Augusta. On commercial work the phasing usually matters more than the price, a blocked entrance costs a tenant far more than the slab does, so we schedule around trading hours, including overnight and weekend pours where that is what the site needs.
Plain broom-finished patio, $6–$15 per square foot. Stamped patio, $12–$20 per square foot. Driveway, $6–$10 per square foot plain or $10–$18 per square foot stamped, and $8–$14 per square foot including removal if the old surface has to come out. Steps price per step, usually $200–$450 per step. Pool decks run $9–$18 per square foot because of the texture and the detailing at the coping.
Four things move a number inside those ranges: the area, the finish, whether there is an existing surface to remove, and whether a truck can reach the pour. That last one catches people out. A back garden a mixer cannot get near means the concrete moves by wheelbarrow, and that labour is a real line on the quote rather than a rounding error.
Detailed pricing by job type: patio cost, driveway cost, stamped concrete per square foot, exposed aggregate cost.
Most people arrive with a picture rather than a specification, which is the right way round. The comparisons that come up most often are concrete against pavers, concrete against asphalt, and stamped against stained. Each of those pages sets out the real trade-off rather than steering you toward the more expensive answer.
One piece of advice worth more than any of them: when you are shown photographs of finished work, ask to see one that is three years old. Everything looks good freshly sealed. What matters is how a finish wears through Georgia summers, and a three-year-old slab tells you that in a way a handover photograph cannot.
Concrete is close to maintenance-free, but "close to" is not "entirely", and the difference shows up after about a decade. Three things actually matter here.
Sealing. Decorative work, stamped, coloured, exposed aggregate , gets its first seal at twenty-eight days and then roughly every two to three years. Use a penetrating silane-siloxane on anything that gets de-iced. Film-forming acrylic looks glossier and will peel where salt gets under it, which is why so many stamped driveways in this region look patchy by year five.
De-icers. Rock salt is the least damaging of the common options. Ammonium sulphate and ammonium nitrate attack concrete chemically and should never go on a slab, despite being sold for exactly that. Nothing should go on concrete in its first winter; use sand for traction instead and let the slab finish gaining strength.
Joints. The one piece of genuine maintenance. Control joints and the expansion joint against the house should stay filled. An open joint is a direct route for water into the base, and water in the base sitting in the clay beneath is what lifts and cracks slabs. A tube of self-levelling sealant every few years prevents a repair that costs thousands.
Most quotes in this trade are a single line and a number, which makes them impossible to compare. Four things should be written down, and if they are not, ask.
Slab thickness. Four inches for a patio or walkway, five for a residential driveway, six where a truck parks. A driveway quoted without a thickness is frequently four inches, which is a patio slab under a car and will fail at the apron first.
Base depth and material. Four to six inches of compacted crushed stone over the clay. "Poured on grade" means straight onto soil, and it means the slab moves when the soil does.
Air entrainment. Five to seven percent for exterior work. This is the specification that separates concrete built for a freeze-thaw climate from concrete that merely survived its first summer.
Joint spacing. Should be stated, and should work out at roughly two to three times the slab thickness in feet. Wide spacing means fewer cuts, faster work, and cracking in the middle of panels.
You are also entitled to see a Georgia contractor licence and a certificate of insurance. A contractor who is reluctant about either is telling you something, and it is worth hearing.
Augusta, Columbia County and Aiken County, 52 neighbourhoods and towns:
Summerville · Olde Town · Harrisburg · Sand Hills · National Hills · Forest Hills · West Augusta · South Augusta · Goshen · Pepperidge · Windsor Spring · Walton Way · Hillcrest · Montclair · Apple Valley · Lake Olmstead · Bethlehem · Turpin Hill · Barton Village · Brynwood · Martinez, GA · Evans, GA · Grovetown, GA · Harlem, GA · Appling, GA · Hephzibah, GA · Blythe, GA · Fort Eisenhower · Downtown Augusta · West Lake · Jones Creek · Riverwood Plantation · Crawford Creek · Bartram Trail · North Augusta, SC · Aiken, SC · Belvedere, SC · Clearwater, SC · Graniteville, SC · Langley, SC · Beech Island, SC · New Ellenton, SC · Warrenville, SC · Bath, SC · Burnettown, SC · Gloverville, SC · Jackson, SC · Edgefield, SC · Trenton, SC · Johnston, SC · Wagener, SC · Windsor, SC
A plain broom-finished patio runs $6–$15 per square foot installed. Stamped work runs $12–$20 per square foot depending on the pattern and whether it is coloured. Those figures include the stone base, an air-entrained mix and cut control joints. Quotes well below them are usually saving money on one of those three.
Foot traffic after about three days, furniture at seven, and cars on a new driveway at seven as well. Heavy vehicles wait twenty-eight days. Decorative work gets sealed at twenty-eight days, once the slab has cured.
Every concrete slab moves, and control joints exist to decide where that movement shows. Cut at the right spacing, cracks follow the joints and stay invisible. What should not happen is a crack with one side sitting higher than the other. That is the base failing, not the concrete, and it means the ground work was skipped.
For work in the public right of way, the sidewalk across your frontage and the driveway apron at the street, yes, and it needs inspecting afterwards. Work behind the property line usually does not, though some lots carry impervious-surface limits that a large new patio can push past. We check before quoting.
Yes, with adjustments. Below about 40°F concrete needs protection, heated blankets, and sometimes a mix change, and that costs more than a pour in May. We will tell you honestly whether waiting is the better call.
Both. Sometimes the honest answer is that a slab can be lifted back to grade or resurfaced for a fraction of replacement. If more than roughly a third of a driveway is failing, though, replacement is genuinely the cheaper route.
Tell us what you need. We answer the same day, and the on-site visit is free.
Call (762) 320-6343. We come out, measure, look at drainage and access, talk through what the space is actually for, and leave you a written price with the specification on it. The visit is free. It takes about twenty minutes, and nobody chases you afterwards.