Height on documents and forms
Passports, driving licences and medical records use whichever system the issuing country uses. Someone recorded as 178 cm is 5 ft 10 in to the nearest inch — a form that only accepts feet and inches forces the rounding.
Length
Convert feet to cm
1 foot equals 30.48 centimeters. Enter a value below to convert instantly.
Feet to centimetres is the conversion that turns a height like 5 ft 9 in into the single metric number that forms, medical charts and international documents ask for. The two-part input is the part worth getting right: the inches have to be folded in before the conversion, not after.
Need the other direction? Convert centimeter to foot →
Formula
Multiply the number of feet by 30.48 to get centimeters.
Step by step
- Start with 1 ft.
- Multiply by the conversion factor 30.48.
- 1 × 30.48 = 30.48 cm.
Feet to Centimeters conversion table
| Feet (ft) | Centimeters (cm) |
|---|---|
| 1 | 30.48 |
| 2 | 60.96 |
| 3 | 91.44 |
| 5 | 152.4 |
| 10 | 304.8 |
| 20 | 609.6 |
| 50 | 1,524 |
| 100 | 3,048 |
| 500 | 15,240 |
| 1,000 | 30,480 |
Where feet and centimeters are used together
Sports rosters and profiles
Player heights appear in centimetres in European leagues and in feet and inches in North American ones, so the same athlete has two published heights. They usually differ slightly because each league rounds to its own nearest unit.
Furniture and fixture heights
Worktop, desk and shelf heights are specified in centimetres by most manufacturers and in inches by US ones. A 90 cm counter is 2 ft 11.4 in — just under the US standard 36 inch counter, which is why imported appliances can sit slightly proud.
Ride and equipment height limits
Minimum height requirements at theme parks, and maximum heights for vehicles and doorways, are posted in local units. Converting tells a visiting family whether a 122 cm limit clears a child measured at 4 ft 1 in — it does, by about a centimetre.
Everyday feet worth knowing
Values people actually look up, with the reason each one comes up. Every figure is calculated with the same engine as the converter above.
| Foot (ft) | Centimeter (cm) | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 30.48 | The base conversion |
| 4 | 121.92 | A child's height |
| 5 | 152.4 | A round height figure |
| 5.5 | 167.64 | 5 feet 6 inches in decimal feet |
| 6 | 182.88 | A round height figure |
| 6.5 | 198.12 | 6 feet 6 inches in decimal feet |
| 8 | 243.84 | A US standard ceiling |
| 10 | 304.8 | A storey of a building |
How these two units are defined
A centimetre is one hundredth of a metre; a foot is exactly 0.3048 metres, so one foot is exactly 30.48 centimetres. The reason this conversion feels awkward is not the factor but the format: metric heights are a single number, while Imperial heights are a compound of two units. Any conversion between them has to handle that mismatch explicitly.
Rounding and precision
Heights are rarely known better than the nearest centimetre or half-inch, so a converted height should be rounded to the nearest inch and nothing finer. Be aware that rounding to the nearest inch changes the number by up to 1.3 cm, which is why a person listed as 5 ft 10 in might measure anywhere from 177.2 to 179.7 cm. The decimal feet shown here are an intermediate step, not the form you should quote a height in.
Mistakes people make with this conversion
-
Reading 5.75 feet as 5 feet 7.5 inches
It is 5 feet 9 inches. Decimal feet are tenths and hundredths of a foot; converting the decimal part means multiplying by 12, not reading it as inches.
-
Converting the feet and forgetting the inches
5 ft 9 in is not 5 × 30.48. Fold the inches into the feet first (9 ÷ 12 = 0.75 ft), then convert 5.75 ft.
-
Double-rounding a height
Rounding to the nearest inch, then converting back and rounding again to the nearest centimetre, can shift a height by two or three centimetres. Convert once from the original measurement.
Read more about these units
Sources for this page
Content on this page last reviewed 12 August 2026. Spotted an error? Report it — see also how these values are calculated.
Convert Foot to other length units
1 ft expressed in every other length unit on this site.
- Meter m 0.3048
- Kilometer km 0.0003048
- Hectometer hm 0.003048
- Dekameter dam 0.03048
- Decimeter dm 3.048
- Centimeter cm 30.48
- Millimeter mm 304.8
- Micrometer µm 304,800
- Nanometer nm 304,800,000
- Picometer pm 304,800,000,000
- Femtometer fm 304,800,000,000,000
- Attometer am 3.048e+17
- Megameter Mm 3.048e-7
- Gigameter Gm 3.048e-10
- Terameter Tm 3.048e-13
- Petameter Pm 3.048e-16
- Exameter Em 3.048e-19
- Angstrom Å 3,048,000,000
- Mile mi 0.00018939394
- Yard yd 0.33333333
- Foot ft 1
- Inch in 12
- Kiloyard kyd 0.00033333333
- League lea 0.000063131313
- Furlong fur 0.0015151515
- Chain ch 0.015151515
- Rod rd 0.060606061
- Perch perch 0.060606061
- Pole pole 0.060606061
- Rope rope 0.05
- Fathom fath 0.16666667
- Link li 1.5151515
- Hand hand 3
- Ell ell 0.26666667
- Barleycorn barleycorn 36
- Mil mil 12,000
- Microinch µin 12,000,000
- Caliber cl 1,200
- Centiinch cin 1,200
- Nautical Mile nmi 0.00016457883
- Nautical Mile (UK) NM (UK) 0.00016447368
- Nautical League nl 0.000054859611
- Nautical League (UK) nl (UK) 0.000054824561
- Mile (US survey) mi (US) 0.00018939356
- Furlong (US survey) fur (US) 0.0015151485
- Chain (US survey) ch (US) 0.015151485
- Rod (US survey) rd (US) 0.060605939
- Fathom (US survey) fath (US) 0.16666633
- Foot (US survey) ft (US) 0.999998
- Link (US survey) li (US) 1.5151485
- Inch (US survey) in (US) 11.999976
- League (statute) st.league 0.000063131187
- Pica pica 72
- Point pt 864
- Twip twip 17,280
- Light Year ly 3.2217385e-17
- Astronomical Unit AU 2.0374622e-12
- Parsec pc 9.8778953e-18
- Kiloparsec kpc 9.8778953e-21
- Megaparsec Mpc 9.8778953e-24
- Earth's Equatorial Radius R⊕(eq) 4.7788249e-8
- Earth's Polar Radius R⊕(pol) 4.7949013e-8
- Earth's Distance from Sun d⊕☉ 2.0374332e-12
- Sun's Radius R☉ 4.3811988e-10
- Bohr Radius a₀ 5,759,885,200
- Electron Radius (classical) rₑ 108,164,110,000,000
- Fermi F 304,800,000,000,000
- X-unit X 3,041,673,300,000
- Planck Length ℓP 1.885841e+34
- Mile (Roman) mi (Rom) 0.00020597322
- Roman Actus actus 0.0085910653
- Arpent arpent 0.0052083333
- Cubit (UK) cubit 0.66666667
- Cubit (Greek) cubit (Gk) 0.6586169
- Long Cubit long cubit 0.57142857
- Reed reed 0.11111111
- Long Reed long reed 0.095238095
- Span (cloth) span 1.3333333
- Finger (cloth) finger 2.6666667
- Nail (cloth) nail 5.3333333
- Handbreadth handbreadth 4
- Fingerbreadth fingerbreadth 16
- Aln aln 0.51332335
- Famn famn 0.17110778
- Ken ken 0.14388489
- Russian Archin archin 0.42857143
- Vara Castellana vara (cast) 0.3649635
- Vara Conuquera vara (con) 0.1216545
- Vara de Tarea vara (tarea) 0.1216545
- Ja (Korean foot) 자 1.00584
- Chi 치 10.0584
- Pun 푼 100.584
- Gan 간 0.16764
- Jang 장 0.100584
- Ri (Korean) 리 0.00077611111
About the foot
The foot (ft) is a Imperial unit of length.
About the centimeter
The centimeter (cm) is a SI unit of length.
Related conversions
Frequently asked questions
What is 5 feet 9 inches in centimetres?
Convert the inches to a fraction of a foot first: 9 ÷ 12 = 0.75, so the height is 5.75 feet, which is 175.26 cm — usually quoted as 175 cm.
What is 6 feet in centimetres?
Exactly 182.88 cm, because a foot is exactly 30.48 cm. Most documents record this as 183 cm.
Should I round a converted height to the nearest centimetre?
Yes. Heights are not measured more finely than that in practice, and a value like 175.26 cm implies a tenth-of-a-millimetre measurement that no height chart supports.
How many centimeters are in a foot?
One foot equals 30.48 centimeters.
How do you convert feet to centimeters?
Multiply the number of feet by 30.48 to get centimeters.
What is 1 centimeter in feet?
One centimeter equals 0.032808399 feet.
When would I convert feet to centimeters?
This conversion is common when measuring height, screen sizes, travel distances, fabric, and construction dimensions.