A used mattress is the one household item almost nobody will take off your hands for free. No charity wants it, Texas funds no recycling program for it, and the city will only come for it under conditions most Austin households don't meet. Here are all five real options — with what each one actually costs, how long it takes, and where it falls apart. If you'd rather skip to the end: a queen is $103 flat, carried down from the bedroom.
Snap a photo — exact flat price back in seconds
Upload a Photo & Get Quote →Start here because everyone does, and because it is worth knowing before you load the thing into a car. For health and hygiene reasons, Goodwill Central Texas, the ARC Resale stores, Habitat for Humanity ReStore and the Salvation Army all decline used mattresses. Not "case by case" — as a standing policy. Occasionally a mattress still in its plastic from a returned delivery gets through, but a bed you have slept on for six years will be turned away at the door, and the volunteer at the donation bay will tell you politely that they get asked ten times a day.
That single fact is the reason this page exists. Every other piece in the bedroom is donatable — the frame, the headboard, the dresser and the nightstands are exactly what those charities want. It is only the mattress and the box spring that have nowhere friendly to go, which is why people end up searching at 11pm with a stripped bed leaning against a wall.
A mattress is genuinely recyclable. Strip it and you get steel springs, polyurethane foam, cotton and fiber batting, and a wooden frame — four commodity streams, most of which have a buyer. The problem in Austin is not the technology, it is the policy. Texas has no statewide mattress-recycling mandate. California, Connecticut and Rhode Island each collect a small fee when you buy a bed and use it to fund free drop-off and take-back; Texas collects nothing and funds nothing. There is no state program to call, no prepaid label, no free municipal mattress day.
What exists instead is private. Regional processors — Spring Back Texas among them, plus a handful of Austin-area recyclers — will break a mattress down, and some accept drop-offs for a modest processing fee. But every one of them requires the same thing from you: get a queen into a vehicle, drive it out there, and arrive during their working hours. If you own a pickup and have a free morning, this is the greenest answer available. If you don't, it isn't an answer at all.
The City of Austin, through Austin Resource Recovery, will collect a mattress — but the program is narrower than most people assume. Residential bulk here is on-demand: you request a collection at austintexas.gov/service/ondemand, you get a set number of free collections a year, each is subject to a volume cap, and it is curbside only. Crucially it serves city-of-Austin residential curbside-trash customers — the households the city already bills for trash pickup.
Apartments and condos are not on it. Multifamily properties in Austin contract private haulers, so their residents cannot request a city bulk collection at all. That excludes the student towers of West Campus (78705), the garden-apartment belt along Riverside Drive (78741, 78742), the Domain mid-rises and every downtown condo — which is to say, it excludes exactly the housing stock that generates the most mattresses. And it excludes the entire suburb ring, because Round Rock, Cedar Park and Georgetown are not City of Austin at all and run their own collection.
If you're near UT, West Campus, or Riverside, leases end July 31 and thousands of mattresses hit the curb at once. Complexes fine you for dumpster-dumping, the bulk schedule can't keep up, and everyone's trying to move the same week. The city knows it: it stands up MoveOutATX donation stations around the student belt each summer, and they work — 249 tons diverted in a past season, per AustinTexas.gov and KVUE. But read what those stations take: housewares, clothing, small furniture, unopened food. Not mattresses. So the one thing you most need to move that week is the one thing the program cannot accept, and the dumpster is already full because 400 of your neighbours had the same idea.
The practical advice for that week is simply to decide early. A bed booked on July 20 is routine; a bed you're standing next to at 9pm on July 31 with a U-Haul due back is not. We run those neighbourhoods hard through August, often same-day.
Send a photo, get a set price by size, and an insured crew carries the mattress down the stairs and out — walk-up, no elevator, no stair fee — then routes it to a recycler where one accepts the load and disposes of the remainder properly. Add the box spring, the frame or the rest of the room to the same quote. No truck rental, no recycling run across the county line, no mattress on the lawn for the HOA to photograph.
One picture of the bed, standing where it is. Tell us the size or let the photo say it — an exact flat number comes back in seconds, with no walkthrough and no "call for a quote."
Same-day is usually open from West Campus out to Kyle and Georgetown. Downtown or Domain tower? We file the COI and book the freight elevator before we roll.
The crew takes the mattress, the box spring and the frame down the stairs and out to the truck. You don't lift it, drag it, or leave it visible on the street.
If you're choosing the paid route, the number is flat and set by size before anyone drives out. The carry-down, the mileage and the disposal are already inside it.
| Item | Flat price |
|---|---|
| Bed frame | $68 |
| Twin mattress | $82 |
| Box spring / foundation (alone) | $92 |
| Full mattress | $94 |
| Queen mattress | $103 |
| King mattress | $114 |
| Mattress + box spring (set) | $143 |
The ladder in plain terms: twin $82 → full $94 → queen $103 → king $114, with the box spring at $68 on its own and $143 if you take it together with the mattress as a set — less than the two priced separately. Add the bed frame at $68 and the bedroom is empty. The minimum order is $75. Clearing more than the bed? Put the dresser and nightstands in the same photo and it gets priced as one job.
For an honest comparison with doing it yourself: Texas Disposal Systems publishes a 2025 gate rate of about $60 per ton for municipal solid waste at its Creedmoor landfill with a two-ton minimum — a single mattress still buys you the two-ton minimum, before the truck rental and the 40-minute drive each way. The City of Austin resident drop-off runs roughly $4.33 per visit-cubic-yard, which is cheap on paper and only works if you already own a pickup.
| Option | Cost | Speed | Effort | The catch |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Donation | Free | — | You transport it | Almost never accepted used — Goodwill, ARC, ReStore and Salvation Army all decline |
| Private recycler | Free–small fee | Half a day | You load, drive, unload | No Texas mandate means no funded take-back; you find one and get it there |
| Austin Resource Recovery on-demand bulk | Free | Scheduled out | You drag it to the curb | Set number of collections a year, volume cap, curbside only, city curbside-trash customers only — apartments excluded |
| Self-haul to the landfill | Truck + gate fee | Half a day | High | TDS Creedmoor ~$60/ton with a 2-ton minimum (Texas Disposal Systems, 2025) |
| Leave it out off-schedule | "Free" | Instant | None | Code violation in the city, HOA notice in the suburbs, chargeback from the complex |
| JunkRabbit | $82–$114 flat | Same day | None | None — photo price, carried down from the bedroom, recycled where a facility takes it |
Prices are flat and photo-quoted; $75 minimum, carry-out and disposal included, and your checkout total is confirmed before you book.
Yes — narrowly. Here is the program in one paragraph, because the details are what decide whether it helps you. Austin Resource Recovery operates residential bulk as an on-demand request rather than a fixed neighbourhood set-out week; you place the request at austintexas.gov/service/ondemand. Each household gets a set number of free collections a year, each collection is subject to a volume cap, and pickup is curbside only — the crew does not come inside, up your stairs, or into the garage. Eligibility is limited to City of Austin residential curbside-trash customers.
Three groups fall outside that, and between them they account for most of the mattresses in this metro. Apartment and condo residents are the biggest: multifamily properties here use private haulers, so they have no access to city bulk whatsoever — that is West Campus, Riverside, the Domain, and every downtown tower. Suburb residents are the second: Round Rock, Cedar Park, Leander, Georgetown, Pflugerville, Hutto, Buda and Kyle are their own cities with their own contracted collection, usually on set bulk days rather than on demand. And anyone in a hurry is the third, because a request is scheduled out and a mattress lying on the lawn in the meantime is precisely what an HOA cites.
None of that makes the program bad — for a single-family house inside the city limits with a spare weekend and a helper to get the bed to the curb, it is free and it works. It simply isn't available to most of the people who search this question.
We'd rather say this plainly than dress it up. Because Texas funds no mattress-recycling program, there is no guaranteed green ending for a bed here the way there is in a mandate state — so what happens depends on the load and on which facility is taking material that day. When a regional processor will accept it, the mattress goes there and gets separated into steel, foam, fiber and wood, with the steel sold on as scrap. When it won't, the mattress is disposed of properly at a permitted facility rather than being fly-tipped down a service road, which is the outcome you are actually paying to avoid.
The rest of the bedroom is easier and we push it hard toward reuse: frames, headboards, dressers, nightstands and lamps go to Goodwill Central Texas, Habitat for Humanity ReStore, ARC Resale or the Austin Furniture Bank when they're in donatable shape, and we'll send a receipt on request. Any electronics that come out with the room go to e-waste, and metal frames that can't be reused go to scrap. If you'd like the usable pieces donated rather than dumped, say so when you book and we'll route them.
Mattress jobs here are access jobs. Austin homes are slab-on-grade with no basements, so the bed is almost always in an upstairs bedroom or already shoved sideways into the garage — and a king does not turn a tight interior stair without two people who have done it before and a plan for the newel post. In West Campus, most units are walk-ups with no elevator, so it's three flights on foot and there is no stair fee for that. In the Riverside complexes the walk to the truck is long and the dumpster enclosure is off-limits for bulk, which is why property managers would rather we take it than find it beside the bin. In the Rainey Street and Domain towers there is no curb at all — the bed leaves through the loading dock, which needs a COI naming the association and management and a freight elevator reserved several business days ahead; we file and book both. And in the HOA suburbs, everything loads from the garage or driveway inside a scheduled window, so nothing ever appears out front.
"Prompt and professional. I will definitely use again."
"Fast, considerate, and thorough"
"Bart's communication was great. He came ready with a large well-equipped truck and moved my furniture in less than 15 minutes. Thank you!"
Can you donate a used mattress in Austin?
Almost never. Goodwill Central Texas, ARC Resale, Habitat ReStore and the Salvation Army all decline used mattresses on hygiene grounds. The frame, headboard and dressers are genuinely donatable — the mattress isn't.
Where can I recycle a mattress in Austin?
At a private recycler you drive it to. Texas has no statewide mattress-recycling mandate, so unlike California, Connecticut or Rhode Island there's no funded take-back and no free drop-off. Spring Back Texas and regional processors will break one down if you get it there.
How much does mattress removal cost in Austin?
Twin $82, full $94, queen $103, king $114. Box spring alone $68; mattress and box spring as a set $143; bed frame $68. $75 minimum, carry-down and disposal included.
Does the City of Austin pick up mattresses?
Through Austin Resource Recovery's on-demand bulk request only — a set number of free collections a year, a volume cap on each, curbside only, city-of-Austin residential curbside-trash customers only. Apartments and condos use private haulers and are excluded.
Is it cheaper to take it to the dump myself?
Rarely. TDS Creedmoor's 2025 gate rate is about $60/ton with a two-ton minimum, so one mattress still buys the two-ton minimum. The city resident drop-off is roughly $4.33 per visit-cubic-yard — cheap, if you already own a truck.
What about during UT move-out?
Book before July 31 if you can. MoveOutATX donation stations divert a lot — 249 tons in a past season — but they take housewares and furniture, not mattresses. We run West Campus and Riverside hard through August, frequently same-day.
Can I just leave it at the curb?
Not safely. Off-schedule it's a code issue inside the city, an HOA violation in Round Rock, Cedar Park, Leander, Georgetown, Circle C and Mueller, and a chargeback if your complex catches it by the dumpster.
Do you take the box spring and frame too?
Yes — the set at $143 beats pricing the mattress and box spring separately, and the frame is $68. Send one photo of the whole room and we'll quote it together.
On paper, rarely. Texas Disposal Systems lists a 2025 gate rate of roughly $60 per ton for municipal solid waste at its Creedmoor landfill with a two-ton minimum, so one mattress still buys you the two-ton minimum. The City of Austin's resident drop-off is about $4.33 per visit-cubic-yard, which is genuinely cheap but assumes you already own a truck, have a second pair of hands, and can spend the morning on it.
Book ahead of July 31. UT leases overwhelmingly end that day, so West Campus and Riverside empty in the same week and every dumpster enclosure fills. The city's MoveOutATX donation stations divert a real volume of goods — 249 tons in a past season per AustinTexas.gov and KVUE — but they take housewares and furniture, not mattresses, so a bed still needs its own plan. We run the student belt hard through August, frequently same-day.
Not without risk. Outside a scheduled on-demand collection it is a code issue in the city, and in the HOA suburbs — Round Rock, Cedar Park, Leander, Georgetown, Circle C, Mueller — a mattress lying out front is exactly what earns a violation notice. Apartment complexes charge back dumpster dumping to the tenant. We load from the bedroom or the garage so nothing is ever staged at the curb.