It's common, but still a suggestion, not a rule. Larger and smaller each look fine.

I love the look but it would be impractical in my house.

Overhang protects your cabinets from spills dripping down the fronts or sides.

How much for the minimum depends on the type of cabinet.

I have water damage on my painted cabinet doors in front of my sink, five years post-remodel, despite trying to be careful to wipe up any water. I'm thinking that the damage would be far worse without the overhang.

My countertop is flush with the cabinets at the end of my peninsula. I do not like the configuration, at all. It’s a heavy use prep area and stuff is forever dripping down the side of the cabinets.

Can you post some pictures of your countertop and the cabinets below, @Muriel Thompson?

The Cook's Kitchen

Never heard of Fenix. Nothing even on the Cdn. Formica website, but they do mention their solid surface acrylic, Everform.

I'm considering Corian and/or re-cycled glass. I've used high-end laminate from Snaidero, quartz and granite. Ready for something new in an international modern style home. But as long as mrs. worthy insists on cooking and baking, I guess some overhang is necessary. The gunk that accumulates under our standard Formica bullnose is warning enough!

Snaidero

Or does the recess between the zero overhang and the actual cabinets (above photo) serve the same purpose as an overhang?

Pretty but I'd probably warn the client in writing.

@Sammy, sure. Crumbs on the countertops, but it’s Christmas, so whatevs. At the end of the other cabinetry run, there is overhang. This just seems like a mistake.

Let's put the drip protection myth to bed please. Window sills have a drip slot. Water runs down the sill, over the edge, goes under, and can't jump the slot so it falls to the ground. Unless your countertop has a drip slot, the water is going to run right around the edge and in front of or behind the drawer fronts.

Joe, respectfully, it doesn’t have to be all one of the other. I’ve had drips that run down the front of a drawer front and then to cabinets below. And I’ve had spills that run right off the countertop to the floor below. It’s both, not either or. The counter lip certainly offers at least some spill protection to the cabinetry below.

Whoever remodeled this kitchen before we bought the house went with about 1/32" overhang. My cabinets fronts aren't damaged. I do wipe them with a damp cloth frequently and have kept any drips from staining.

My issue is cleaning up after prep. Even making toast. The only way to wipe crumbs into a hand is to open a darned drawer. I really dislike for that reason. Just not enough to pull the trigger on a remodel of a kitchen that works quite well otherwise.

We have .5" overhang and I find that it is just enough to still look good (not a fan of a large overhang) and still function for wiping up and spills.

ETA: our cabs are about 12 years old and black and the finish has held up.

I am a fabricator. A zero overhang is problematic. For it to work the top of the cabinets must be exactly flat (usually they're not) and the back of the stone must also be perfectly flat (almost never the case). The overhang masks the inconsistent joint between the stone and cabinets. This inconsistency is why countertops usually must be shimmed to fill the places where there is a gap. After 2 jobs that were a major PITA I tell a customer that SIMPLY MUST have a zero overhang to go elsewhere.

I have seen & experienced first-hand that the overhang does, in fact, protect cabinets from drips, etc. I've spilled many a liquid over the years and unless it's a massive amount of liquid, the dripping fluid DOES drip to the floor and not on my cabinets! I'm very thankful for that 1.5" overhang!

Some have noted that the edge can make a difference. Full bullnose, for example, doesn't do much since the fully rounded edge actually directs the fluids under the overhang. I don't have experience with it, but I remember it coming up several years ago.

In addition, that overhang helps protect against hip bruises. I would probably have permanently bruised hips if I had the Kitchen in the original post -- I'd be constantly bumping those drawer pulls when working at the counter. The overhang keeps me just far enough away from the drawer pulls to avoid hitting them.

We love the zero overhang look and my husband insisted on it in our last renovation despite my gentle suggestions it was not practical. Within two months he was cursing it. We didn’t have any water drip problems, but hated wiping crumbs off the counter- crazy annoying. I’d get the bear minimum overhang without it being zero.

We also wanted zero overhang for the look but were advised to go with a minimal one. We ended up with 1/4” overhang which still looks good in our opinion even though it was a compromise. We have drips on the cabs but we had that with the 1.5” overhang in the previous kitchen too- no difference there for us.

The look of flush, or nearly-flush, counters is sleek, but it seems that function is sacrificed for form. Unless you have push-to-open cabinets or hidden hardware, your hardware will stick out farther than the countertops. If anyone ever leans against the countertop in your house, they'll end up putting pressure on the handles/doors/drawers instead. So that's another strike, IMO, in addition to the considerations about cleaning off counters and possibly having drips run down your cabinets.

Blame it all on le corbusier.