We show for $κ\in (4,8)$ that the canonical conformally covariant measure on the conformal loop ensemble (CLE$_κ$) gasket, previously constructed indirectly by the first co-author and Schoug, can be realized as the limit of several natural approximation schemes. These include the Euclidean Minkowski content and its box-count variants, the properly renormalized number of dyadic squares that intersect the gasket, and the properly renormalized minimal number of balls of radius $δ$ necessary to cover the gasket with respect to both its canonical geodesic and resistance metrics. This in particular allows us to identify the CLE$_6$ gasket measure with the conformally covariant measure constructed by Garban-Pete-Schramm as a scaling limit of the number of vertices in a macroscopic critical percolation cluster on the triangular lattice. Along the way, we show that the CLE gasket measure of every fixed compact set has finite moments of all orders; previously this was only known for first moments.