Automatic Gate Cost: Swing vs. Slide

The price of an automatic gate is the gate plus the operator and controls, and the options chosen for each move both numbers. The gate can swing or roll on a V-track, in ornamental iron or chain link, and the operator can run on your power or on solar, with a keypad, card readers, remotes, a phone app, or vehicle loops. This post gives the price of each part and what each option changes.

What the gate itself costs

The width of the opening sets most of the price, because a wider opening takes more steel and makes a heavier leaf. The type, the material, and the hardware also change it, and iron costs more to fabricate than chain link.

We fabricate these commercial gates in our own shop, in ornamental iron or chain link. A pedestrian gate with a panic bar and self-closing hinges costs more than one with a plain latch.

Swing or slide

The opening, the grade and the room around it decide the type.

A swing gate needs clear ground through its whole arc, so nothing can sit in that space. A double swing splits the opening into two leaves, up to about 24 feet. A motorized single swing leaf goes up to about 16 feet.

A sliding gate rolls to one side on a track set in concrete, so it needs room to travel along the fence line instead of room to open through. On a sloped driveway a slide gate usually fits better, because a swing leaf has to clear the rising ground as it opens.

Both automate, with the operator matched to the type: a swing-arm unit for a swing gate, a pad-mounted unit for a slide gate.

What automation adds

On a gate that is already there, the operator and the controls run $5,000 to $10,000 and up. With power from your panel, an operator with loops, a keypad, a Knox key switch and two remotes runs $6,900 to $7,000. A solar operator with a simple keypad runs $7,000 to $7,700, and a solar operator with smart entry $9,500 to $10,500. What moves it is the operator the gate calls for, how far the power is, and how many ways people get in.

The controls are the keypad, the card readers, the remotes, the phone app, the vehicle loops, and the fire department hardware. We wire what the site uses, or tie into the access control system you already run.

What a standard install includes

The operator, the photo eyes and edge sensors, and two remotes. Your electrician brings power to the gate, and once it is there our technician mounts and programs the system. Where the panel is far enough that trenching costs more than the operator, the operator runs on solar instead.

We install new operators we can warranty rather than troubleshooting an aging one part by part.

Getting a number

Send the width of the opening, swing or slide, photos of the entrance, and how people and vehicles need to get in.