Cremation urns

You are not required to buy one

Every cremation returns the ashes in a sealed plastic bag inside a temporary container, usually rigid plastic or heavy cardboard, and that container is included in the price of the cremation. Some families keep it. Some transfer the ashes to something else weeks later, when the decision is not being made in a room full of merchandise.

A mid range urn costs around $295, and that is the figure this site uses when it builds a realistic cremation total. It is worth understanding that the urn is a discretionary purchase sitting on top of a direct cremation that is already the least expensive route available. Nothing about the cremation itself changes based on what you put the ashes in.

How to size an urn

Urns are measured in cubic inches, and the industry rule of thumb is one cubic inch of urn capacity for every pound of the person’s healthy adult body weight. Somebody who weighed 180 pounds needs about 180 cubic inches. The standard adult urn is 200 cubic inches, which covers most adults with room to spare.

Cremated remains are bone fragments reduced to a coarse grain, and an adult typically produces somewhere between about four and six pounds of them. The volume, not the weight, is what has to fit.

If you are unsure, size up. An urn that is slightly too small is a genuinely distressing problem to discover on the day, and the crematory can tell you the exact volume of the remains before you buy anything. Ask them.

Types and what each costs

The ranges below are typical retail figures rather than survey medians, and they move a great deal between a funeral home display case and an online retailer selling the identical item. Treat them as a guide to the shape of the market, and see cremation urn cost for a closer look at the materials.

Buying for a niche, a grave or a green burial

If the urn is going into a columbarium niche, measure the niche before you buy. Interior dimensions vary enormously between cemeteries, doors are often smaller than the cavity, and some cemeteries specify a maximum size or require a particular material. A beautiful urn that will not fit through the opening is an avoidable and expensive mistake.

For burial of an urn in a grave or an urn garden, ask whether the cemetery requires an urn vault or an outer container. Many do, on the same settling grounds they use for a full burial vault, and it is a separate charge.

For a natural or green burial ground, the urn will usually need to be biodegradable and free of metal, varnish and adhesives. Ask the burial ground what it accepts rather than assuming, because standards differ between sites.

Keepsakes, jewellery and dividing ashes

Dividing ashes between family members is lawful everywhere in the United States and is increasingly common. There is no federal restriction on it. The practical questions are who does the dividing, which most crematories and funeral homes will do on request, and whether every branch of the family has agreed in advance.

Some faith traditions do not permit division, and some do not permit cremation at all. If that is live in your family, settle it before the cremation rather than afterwards, because it is not a decision that can be revisited.

Keepsake urns and cremation jewellery hold a very small quantity, typically a pinch to a teaspoon. Ask the funeral home or the retailer who fills and seals them. Doing it yourself is possible and many families find it a meaningful thing to do, but a sealed piece done properly is more secure if it is going to be worn every day.

Where to buy, and the rule that protects you

Under the FTC Funeral Rule a funeral provider must accept an urn you obtained elsewhere and may not charge you a handling or set up fee for using it. It also may not refuse to handle the cremation because you declined to buy its urn. That right exists precisely because the markup on merchandise is where a great deal of funeral home margin sits.

Online retailers, general merchandisers and independent woodworkers all sell urns, and the same unit is routinely a fraction of the funeral home display price. Order early enough to allow for engraving, which commonly adds several working days, and have it delivered to the funeral home if you would rather not handle the transfer yourself. How families get overcharged covers the same pattern across caskets, vaults and packages.

Posting ashes

The United States Postal Service is the only carrier in the United States that accepts cremated remains, domestically and internationally. Private couriers do not accept them. This surprises families every time and it is the reason a cremation near the place of death is so much cheaper than transporting a body home.

USPS sets out the requirements in Publication 139. In short, remains travel by Priority Mail Express domestically and Priority Mail Express International abroad, in a sift proof inner container, cushioned inside a strong outer box, with the official Label 139 applied to the outside. USPS sells a purpose made kit. Follow the packaging rules exactly, because the consequence of a failure here is not a lost parcel in the ordinary sense.

Countries differ sharply on what documentation they require to receive human remains, so check the destination requirements before you post anything internationally.

Flying with an urn

Cremated remains may be carried through airport security in the United States, but the container has to pass through the X-ray machine, and TSA officers will not open it under any circumstances. If the material is too dense to see through, the container cannot be cleared and will not be allowed through the checkpoint.

That rules out most solid metal and thick stone urns for carry on. The practical answer is a temporary container of wood, plastic or heavy cardboard for the flight, with the permanent urn packed separately or shipped. Carry the cremation certificate and a certified copy of the death certificate, and check the airline policy as well, because some carriers have their own rules about remains in the cabin or the hold.

Scattering urns and where scattering is allowed

A scattering tube is a cardboard cylinder designed to pour in a controlled line rather than a cloud, and it is worth the small cost purely for the practicality of it on a windy day. Biodegradable water urns float briefly and then sink and dissolve.

On private land you need the permission of the landowner and nothing more. At sea, the Environmental Protection Agency permits burial of human remains, including cremated remains, at least three nautical miles from shore, requires that anything else placed in the water is readily decomposable, and requires the event to be reported to the regional EPA office within 30 days. In national parks a permit is generally required and conditions are attached. State and local rules vary, and public parks, beaches and waterways are governed by whoever manages them, so ask first.

One quiet piece of advice from families who have done it. Decide the place before the day, take somebody with you, and keep a small keepsake portion back if anybody in the family is uncertain. Scattering cannot be undone. Cremation compared with burial covers the permanence question in more depth, and cremation cost breaks down the fee itself.