feet to cm
The factor is exact, so the only rounding is the one you ask for.
The short answer
A foot is exactly 30.48 cm, so 5 ft 10 in is 177.8 cm. Multiply the feet by 30.48 and add 2.54 for every inch.
Height is the reason most people need this conversion, so the table below is built from the heights people actually type rather than a run of round numbers.
The formula
cm = feet × 30.48 + inches × 2.54
Worked examples
- 5 ft 10 in
- 177.8 cm
- 6 ft
- 182.88 cm
- 5 ft 4 in
- 162.56 cm
Reference table
| Feet and inches | Centimetres | To the nearest cm |
|---|---|---|
| 4 ft 10 in | 147.32 cm | 147 cm |
| 5 ft 0 in | 152.4 cm | 152 cm |
| 5 ft 2 in | 157.48 cm | 157 cm |
| 5 ft 4 in | 162.56 cm | 163 cm |
| 5 ft 6 in | 167.64 cm | 168 cm |
| 5 ft 8 in | 172.72 cm | 173 cm |
| 5 ft 10 in | 177.8 cm | 178 cm |
| 6 ft 0 in | 182.88 cm | 183 cm |
| 6 ft 2 in | 187.96 cm | 188 cm |
| 6 ft 4 in | 193.04 cm | 193 cm |
How to use it
- 01Put the feet in the first fieldWhole feet. If you are only working in feet, leave the inches field at zero.
- 02Put the inches in the secondAnything from 0 to 11. Half inches are fine; the field steps in halves because that is how tape measures are marked.
- 03Read the centimetresThe line underneath restates the conversion in words so you can check the tool read your figures the way you meant them.
Also searched for
Searches that land here include feet to cm, feet and inches to cm, ft to cm, height in cm and convert feet to centimetres.
Feet, inches and the metric system
One exact factor, applied twice
An inch has been exactly 2.54 centimetres since 1959, when the national standards bodies of the English-speaking countries agreed to a single definition. A foot is twelve of those inches, so a foot is exactly 30.48 centimetres. Both numbers are definitions rather than measurements, which means this conversion introduces no error of its own: multiply, add, and the only rounding is the one you choose for the display.
Why the two-field form
A height in feet and inches is two numbers, and people say them as two numbers. Asking for 5.83 feet instead of 5 feet 10 inches invites a mistake, because the decimal part of a foot is not intuitive: 5.1 feet is 5 feet and a bit over an inch, not 5 feet 1 inch. Keeping the fields separate removes that trap altogether.
Rounding, and where it matters
For a form, a whole centimetre is enough. For anything that has to fit, keep the decimal: over a 6 foot span, rounding each end to the nearest centimetre can shift a measurement by most of a centimetre, which is the difference between a shelf that slides in and one that does not.
Questions people ask
How many cm is 5 foot 10?
177.8 cm, exactly. Seventy inches at 2.54 cm each comes to 177.8 with nothing left over, which is why this particular height is one of the few that lands on a tenth of a centimetre rather than somewhere untidy.
Why do forms ask for height in centimetres?
Because most of the world records height in centimetres, and a single number is easier to store and compare than a pair of them. Medical forms, visa applications and sports registrations tend to want the metric figure even in countries where nobody says it out loud.
Should I round my height to a whole centimetre?
For a form, yes, unless it asks for a decimal. Height changes by more than half a centimetre through a normal day as the spine settles, so a figure carried to two decimal places is more precise than the measurement behind it.