Feet to cm converter, feet and inches to centimeters.

To convert feet to cm, multiply the feet by 30.48. One foot is 30.48 cm, 5 feet is 152.4 cm and 6 feet is 182.88 cm. A foot is 12 inches and an inch is exactly 2.54 cm, so 30.48 is exact too. Because heights are usually said in feet and inches, this page lets you type them together.

How to use the converter

1. Type feet in the Feet (ft) box, for example 6.
2. For feet and inches, type a mixed number: 5 ft 11 in is 5 11/12. The big result shows centimeters.
3. The Feet and inches card turns a decimal such as 5.75 into 5 ft 9 in. The other cards give inches and meters.
4. Type centimeters in the second box to go back. Pick Decimals 0 or 1 for a height.
5. Click a row in Common values, or press Copy result, Copy link or Print chart.

Where 30.48 comes from

NIST Handbook 44 (2026), Appendix C says 1 inch is 2.54 centimeters exactly, that 12 inches make a foot, and that 1 foot is 0.3048 meter exactly. Multiply 12 by 2.54 and you get 30.48. Page checked 18 Oct 2026. It is a clean multiplication, so there is no hidden rounding. If your answer has many digits, it is because the feet you typed were a repeating fraction such as 5 1/3.

A mental shortcut, and its error

Multiply by 30 and add a little. For 6 ft: 6 × 30 = 180, and the extra 0.48 per foot is 2.88, so 182.88 cm. A quicker version is to take 30.5. At 6 ft that gives 183 cm, only 0.12 cm above the exact 182.88 cm. Plain 30 is 1.57 percent low, which is 2.88 cm at 6 ft. That matters when you compare two heights a centimeter apart.

Worked examples

• 5 ft 7 in. Type 5 7/12. That is 67 inches, and 67 × 2.54 = 170.18 cm.
• 5 ft 11 in. 71 inches × 2.54 = 180.34 cm.
• 6 ft 2 in. 74 inches × 2.54 = 187.96 cm.
• A bookshelf 3.5 ft wide. 3.5 × 30.48 = 106.68 cm.
• A door 6 ft 8 in tall. 80 inches × 2.54 = 203.2 cm, or 2.032 m.

A mistake to avoid: 5.11 is not 5 ft 11 in

The most common error is writing a height like 5.11 and treating it as 5 ft 11 in. As a decimal, 5.11 ft is 155.75 cm. The height of 5 ft 11 in is 180.34 cm, a gap of 24.59 cm. The inches are twelfths of a foot, not hundredths. Type the mixed number, or convert in two steps with the Inches to CM converter. A second error is to forget that the foot has 12 inches and not 10, which is why the table of heights is useful to look at.

Common heights in centimeters

The table shows exact values for heights in whole feet and inches, rounded to one decimal place.

Every extra inch is 2.54 cm, so three inches is 7.62 cm. If someone says they are 5 ft 8 in, that is 172.7 cm, and 5 ft 8.5 in (type 5 17/24) is 174 cm. Use whole centimeters for forms and one decimal for a growth chart. When you quote a height, say which of the two forms you mean, because 5.7 ft and 5 ft 7 in are two different heights.

Each inch in centimeters

Because a height is feet plus inches, it helps to know the inches by themselves. Each inch is exactly 2.54 cm, so you can build any height by adding.

So 5 ft 9 in is 60 inches plus 9 inches: 152.4 + 22.86 = 175.26 cm. Doing it this way is a good check on the converter, which gives 175.26 cm.

Who uses feet to cm

People filling in a form that asks for height in centimeters. Shoppers reading a size guide. Doctors and trainers who record metric heights for patients from the US. Buyers of furniture and rugs in feet who need to check a space measured in centimeters. For the other direction use the CM to feet. For longer lengths in meters see Feet to meters.