Sub-rectangular in shape and measuring roughly 50 metres north to south and 33 metres east to west, the graveyard is modest in scale but consistent in form with the kind of monastic burial ground that once served both the religious community within the walls and the lay population of the surrounding area. The pairing of church and graveyard was a practical and spiritual arrangement that shaped the Irish landscape for centuries, and Caherabbey preserves that relationship in its simplest physical terms.

The site was already well established enough by 1840 to appear on the first edition Ordnance Survey six-inch map, where it is marked as 'Grave Yd.', a label repeated on the later 25-inch edition. That consistency across two rounds of cartographic surveying suggests a place that was recognised and used across generations, even as the abbey itself passed out of active religious life. The surrounding stone wall, still defining the boundary of the plot, would have served the dual function common to such enclosures: keeping livestock out and marking the ground as set apart from ordinary land.