Universal Length Converter
Convert across many related units. Enter your value and which unit it uses.
About this calculator
The span this page covers runs from a millimetre to the astronomical unit, ten columns wide, all pivoting on the metre. Several of its constants are exact by definition rather than measured: the nautical mile is precisely 1852 m, fixed by international agreement to approximate one minute of arc along a meridian, and the astronomical unit has been frozen at exactly 149,597,870,700 m since IAU Resolution B2 redefined it in 2012 instead of tying it to Earth's orbit. The statute mile is 1609.344 m, the inch 0.0254 m, and the yard 0.9144 m — all exact under the 1959 international yard-and-pound agreement documented in NIST's own SI conversion guide (Special Publication 811), which is why the imperial columns here carry no measurement uncertainty of their own.
The retired US survey foot, two parts per million longer, is not offered; that gap is invisible on a workbench and material across a township boundary. A few practical limits: entry is decimal only, so a fractional inch has to be typed as 0.375 rather than 3/8, and every column is rounded to nine decimal places before it is displayed, which pushes the astronomical-unit result to a hard zero for any terrestrial distance rather than merely a small number. Light-years, parsecs and angular measures such as mils are outside the table entirely.
Convert
Results
Figures current as of 2012. Sources: NIST Special Publication 811 (2008 ed.), "Guide for the Use of the International System of Units (SI)" — documents the international yard as exactly 0.9144 m (and the derived foot, 0.3048 m, and inch, 0.0254 m) per the 1959 Federal Register notice (24 FR 5348) that unified the U.S. yard with other countries'; the nautical mile is listed as exactly 1852 m., International Astronomical Union, XXVIII General Assembly (2012), Resolution B2 — re-defines the astronomical unit as a conventional unit of length equal to exactly 149,597,870,700 m, rather than a value derived from solar-system dynamics.
How to Use This Calculator
- Enter Value and choose the Input unit (m, cm, mm, km, in, ft, yd, mi, nmi, or au).
- The calculator converts your value across all ten length units at once.
- Review the highlighted m result for the converted value in meters.
- Check cm, mm, km, in, ft, yd, mi, nmi, and au for the same value in each unit.
- Use the As m figure for the precise base-unit equivalent.
How the result changes with Value
| Value | m |
|---|---|
| 0.5 | 0.5 |
| 0.75 | 0.75 |
| 1.5 | 1.5 |
| 2.5 | 2.5 |
What each input means
- Value
- Numeric amount in the selected unit.
- Input unit
- The unit your input value is expressed in.
How this is calculated
Formula
Converted Length = Input × (From Factor / To Factor), base unit: meters (m)Figures and sources
- Inch, foot, yard, and nautical mile — exact SI length conversion factors (1959) — NIST Special Publication 811 (2008 ed.), "Guide for the Use of the International System of Units (SI)" — documents the international yard as exactly 0.9144 m (and the derived foot, 0.3048 m, and inch, 0.0254 m) per the 1959 Federal Register notice (24 FR 5348) that unified the U.S. yard with other countries'; the nautical mile is listed as exactly 1852 m.
- Astronomical unit fixed at exactly 149,597,870,700 metres (2012) — International Astronomical Union, XXVIII General Assembly (2012), Resolution B2 — re-defines the astronomical unit as a conventional unit of length equal to exactly 149,597,870,700 m, rather than a value derived from solar-system dynamics.
Engine last updated . Checked against 3 independently-derived tests — how we verify calculators. Built by Paul Gunder, a software engineer, not a licensed financial, medical, or legal professional.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is a nautical mile 1852 metres and not something rounder?
It was chosen to approximate one minute of latitude along a meridian, which makes chart work and dead reckoning simple: one minute of arc equals one nautical mile. The metric value 1852 was then fixed exactly by international agreement rather than left to vary with latitude, and NIST's own SI conversion guide (Special Publication 811) lists it as an exact figure, not a rounded one.
Is the mile column the survey mile or the international one?
The international mile, 1609.344 metres exactly. The US survey mile was about two parts per million longer and was retired in 2022; over a township-scale traverse that difference amounts to several centimetres, which is why land records specify which one.
Why does the astronomical unit column read zero for everyday distances?
One au is exactly 149,597,870,700 metres — a value the International Astronomical Union fixed by Resolution B2 in 2012 rather than tying it to Earth's actual orbit — and results are rounded to nine decimal places before display. A room, a road or a marathon is such a small fraction of an au that the rounding takes it to exactly zero rather than to a very small number.
Can I enter a fractional inch like 3/8?
Not as a fraction. The value field accepts decimals only, so three-eighths has to be entered as 0.375 and a sixteenth as 0.0625. Woodworking and machining figures written in fractional inches need converting to decimal before they go in.
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