Length & Distance Converter
Convert between metres, kilometres, centimetres, millimetres, miles, yards, feet, inches, nautical miles and light years.
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Metric vs Imperial Length
The metric system uses metres as the base unit. A kilometre is 1,000 metres; a centimetre is 1/100 of a metre. Nearly every country in the world uses metric officially. The United States is the main exception, using feet, inches, yards and miles for everyday distances.
Nautical Miles and Navigation
A nautical mile (1,852 metres) is based on the Earth's circumference — one nautical mile corresponds to one minute of arc along a meridian. Aviation and maritime navigation worldwide use nautical miles and the related unit of speed, the knot (1 nautical mile per hour). GPS coordinates in degrees and minutes translate directly to nautical miles.
Frequently Asked Questions
1 metre = 3.28084 feet exactly (or 3 feet 3.37 inches). Conversely, 1 foot = 0.3048 metres. A quick approximation: multiply metres by 3.3 for feet, or divide feet by 3.3 for metres.
1 mile = 1.60934 kilometres. 1 kilometre = 0.621371 miles. A practical shortcut: 5 miles ≈ 8 kilometres. So 100 km/h ≈ 62 mph, and 60 mph ≈ 97 km/h.
A light year is the distance light travels in one year in a vacuum — approximately 9.461 × 10^15 metres or about 9.46 trillion kilometres. It is used to express distances between stars and galaxies, where kilometres would produce unwieldy numbers.
1 inch = 2.54 centimetres exactly. This is a fixed defined conversion. To convert inches to cm, multiply by 2.54. To convert cm to inches, divide by 2.54. Example: 6 feet = 72 inches × 2.54 = 182.88 cm.
1 yard = 3 feet = 0.9144 metres. Yards are used in American football (field length), golf (distance to hole), and fabric measurements in the United States. In the UK, yards appear in road signs for short distances.