Convert m² to ares square metres ↔ ares Free Online Secure
Type a value in square metres and read it in ares at once. The factor is exact by definition, the arithmetic happens in your browser, and nothing is sent anywhere.
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Common values — Convert m² to ares (square metres ↔ ares)
| m² | a |
|---|---|
| 1 | 0.01 |
| 2 | 0.02 |
| 3 | 0.03 |
| 5 | 0.05 |
| 10 | 0.1 |
| 20 | 0.2 |
| 50 | 0.5 |
| 100 | 1 |
Where these units come from
Square units need no definition of their own: a square metre is a metre by a metre, and everything follows from the length. The land measures are older and stranger. The acre began as the land a yoke of oxen could plough in a day, which is why it was long and thin rather than square — one chain by one furlong, 4840 square yards. The hectare and the are came out of the French Revolution, when land had to be measured in something decimal; neither belongs to the International System, but both were kept for land because a hectare is a comfortable size to picture and a square metre is not. Since the 1959 agreement on the yard, the acre is exactly 4046.8564224 square metres, so the conversions on this page are exact rather than approximate.
Where you meet them
Square metres price flats, size carpets and decide how much paint a wall needs; square feet do the same work in the United States and in much of the property market worldwide. Hectares belong to farmland, forests and planning permissions; acres to land deeds in the English-speaking world. Square kilometres and square miles are for countries, lakes and fires. Square centimetres and square millimetres live in workshops, on datasheets and anywhere a cross-section matters.
Questions people ask
How big is a square metre in practice?
A square one metre on each side. A standard interior door is about 1.8 square metres, a single bed about 2 and a small bathroom around 4. Floor space, paint coverage and property prices are usually quoted per square metre, so a rough feel for the size helps you judge whether a listed figure is generous or tight.
What is an are?
An are is 100 square metres, a square ten metres on each side, and 100 of them make a hectare. The name is French and the unit is rarely used today, surviving mostly in the land registers and agricultural statistics of a few countries. You will see it more often as the prefix in hectare than on its own.
Is the answer exact?
Where both units are defined in terms of one another by whole numbers, yes — the page says so above the figure, and the only rounding is in how many digits are shown. Where the ratio has no finite decimal, the page shows twelve significant digits and says the relation is approximate rather than pretending otherwise.
Does anything I type leave my device?
No. The arithmetic runs in your browser; nothing is uploaded and there is no server to upload it to. Load the page once and it keeps working with the network switched off.
Six sotkas, one tsubo and a rai: land units of the world, counted in ares
The are is a hundred square metres, and a surprising number of traditional land units are close to it or to a simple multiple of it. A Russian dacha plot is measured in sotkas, each exactly one are; a Japanese se is almost one; a Thai ngan is four. When you meet a plot given in square metres and want a number that resembles those units, you divide by 100. To convert m² to ares divide by 100, moving the decimal point two places to the left. So 600 m² is 6 ares, 1,250 m² is 12.5 ares and 45 m² is 0.45 are. This page divides as you type, and the text below tours land units around the world in ares.
You will find the rule with worked examples, short profiles of both units, a comparison, a long tour of real situations and a list of the mistakes people make most often. The calculation runs in your browser and nothing you type is sent anywhere.
How to convert m² to ares: divide by 100
The rule
One are equals exactly 100 square metres. To convert m² to ares, divide the square metres by 100, which means moving the decimal point two places to the left. So 300 m² is 3 ares, 750 m² is 7.5 ares, 4,000 m² is 40 ares and 10,000 m² is 100 ares, a hectare. In the other direction, multiply ares by 100.
Worked examples
A plot of 480 m² is 4.8 ares. A plot of 1,350 m² is 13.5 ares. A field of 8,200 m² is 82 ares, nearly a hectare. For small areas the answer is a fraction of an are: 25 m² is 0.25 are, and 7 m² is 0.07 are.
An easy shift
Because 100 is a power of ten, no arithmetic is needed beyond moving the decimal point. Cut the last two digits off a whole number of square metres and you have the ares: 850 m² becomes 8.50.
A quick check
The are is the bigger unit, so the number must shrink by two digits. If your “convert m² to ares” calculation produced a bigger number than the one you began with, you multiplied.
The square metre
The base unit
The square metre is the area of a square one metre on each side. It is the SI unit and is used for rooms, flats, plots and most land in the metric world. A plot for a house is typically 500 to 1,000 m².
Where it appears
Land registers, notarial deeds, building permits and real estate advertisements in nearly every country that uses the metric system.
The are
A hundred square metres
The are is a square of ten metres by ten, introduced in France in 1795 as the base of the decimal land system. A hectare is a hundred ares. It is still used in land registers in several countries, and its cousins are found in traditional units from Russia to Japan.
Where it appears
Land registers in France, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, building plots in Belgium and Switzerland, and the vocabulary of gardeners in many places.
Square metre and are compared
An are holds a hundred square metres. It is a convenient unit for plots of gardens and houses, where the number of square metres would have three or four digits. A plot of 8 ares is easier to say than one of 800 square metres.
The conversion is just a move of the decimal point, so there is no risk of rounding error. The only risk is mixing up units that sound alike, such as are, acre and the abbreviation a.
Where the conversion appears
Russian and Ukrainian dacha plots
A dacha plot in Russia or Ukraine is described in sotkas, one sotka being a hundred square metres, exactly one are. The usual plot is six sotkas, 600 m², or ten, 1,000 m². A visitor from abroad who sees "6 sotok" can use a “convert m² to ares” calculation to check that the plot is 6 ares. The unit shows how closely the metric are lives on in popular speech.
Japan, Korea and Taiwan
A Japanese tsubo is 3.3 m², and a se, 30 tsubo, is 99.17 m², almost exactly one are. A tan, ten se, is 991.7 m², 9.9 ares. In Korea and Taiwan the pyeong is also 3.3 m². Real estate in these countries uses the traditional units, and a conversion from square metres shows what a foreign investor is buying.
Thailand and Southeast Asia
A Thai ngan is 400 m², 4 ares, and a rai is 1,600 m², 16 ares. A plot of 3 rai and 2 ngan is 5,600 m², 56 ares. Thai land deeds give rai, ngan and square wah, 4 m², all in one expression, which an international buyer must break down and convert.
The Chinese mu
A mu is 666.7 m², 6.67 ares, and 15 mu make a hectare. Chinese farm statistics use mu for household farms. A family farm of 5 mu is 3,333 m², 33.3 ares. Researchers who compare yields across countries convert mu to hectares or ares as an intermediate step.
A sense of scale
An are is a square of ten metres, about the area of a large living room plus a kitchen. A tennis court is 2.6 ares, a basketball court 4.2, a football pitch 71. These pictures give you a feeling for the number you get from a conversion, and tell you if it is plausible.
Reading plans at scale 1:1,000
On a plan at a scale of 1:1,000, a square centimetre represents 100 m², exactly one are. A plot drawn as a rectangle of 2 by 4 cm is 8 ares. Surveyors use this scale for building lots, so the relation is a handy shortcut for reading plans.
Rounding
The factor 100 is exact. Give the same number of decimals as in the source: 123 m² is 1.23 ares. If a plot was paced, state it as about 1.2 ares. Do not add digits that the measurement cannot support.
Spreadsheet use
Put square metres in column A and write =A2/100 in column B. For the reverse, use =B2*100. Format with two decimals. For a table of plots, add a total and compare it with the area of the whole estate.
Teaching the idea
Mark a square of 10 by 10 metres on a playground and call it an are. Ask students to stand along its edge and estimate how many such squares make a hectare. The answer, 100, can be checked by marking a square ten times bigger on each side. The two squares show the factor of 100 at a glance.
Fencing a plot
A plot of 6 ares, 600 m², of 20 by 30 metres, has a perimeter of 100 metres. A square plot of the same area has a side of 24.5 metres and a perimeter of 98. Fencing is priced by the metre, but plots are described by area, so people estimate with both.
Rain on a plot
A rainfall of 10 mm on a plot of 8 ares, 800 m², delivers 8,000 litres, 8 cubic metres. A roof of 1 are would collect 1,000 litres from the same shower. Rainwater harvesting designers start from the area in square metres, and a “convert m² to ares” calculation puts it in the unit of the plot.
Greenhouses and polytunnels
A polytunnel of 8 by 30 metres has 240 m², 2.4 ares. A greenhouse of 3 by 6 metres, 18 m², is 0.18 are. A market gardener with 20 ares, 2,000 m², can run eight tunnels of this size. Growers state their covered area in square metres and their land in ares.
The are in Polish and Czech property ads
In Poland a building plot is often advertised as "10 arów", ten ares, 1,000 m². In the Czech Republic and Slovakia plots are given in square metres, but older garden colonies speak of ares. A foreign buyer reading a Polish listing meets the are and should not confuse it with the acre. A “convert m² to ares” calculation gives the plain number of square metres and removes the doubt.
Land for urban gardens in Europe
A city may set aside 5,000 m², 50 ares, for 25 community garden plots of 2 ares each. A plot of 2 ares is 200 m², roughly the size of a one storey house. Urban planners think in ares for plots and hectares for the whole site, so conversion happens in every garden project.
Burgundy and the ouvrée
In Burgundy, vineyard plots are measured in ouvrées, each 4.28 ares, 428 m², the area a worker could dig in a day. A hectare holds 23 ouvrées. A small plot of 3 ouvrées is 12.8 ares, 1,284 m². The unit lives on in wine deeds, and a “convert m² to ares” calculation helps visitors who read an English guide to the region.
Hobby farms and homesteads
A hobby farm with a house, a goat shed, a vegetable garden and a small orchard might occupy 40 to 80 ares, 4,000 to 8,000 m². At the upper end it supports a few animals and a family's vegetables. Readers of homesteading magazines from different countries compare plots in the unit of their own country, and the are is the common ground between acres and square metres.
Reading old family documents
An old document may say that a grandfather left "forty ares" to his children. That is 4,000 m², very nearly one acre, since 4,000 m² is 0.99 acre. Converting the old unit to square metres, and then to ares, shows what the inheritance really amounted to and lets descendants identify the land on modern maps.
The are and the hectare in school
Many school textbooks teach the ladder of area units: square millimetre, square centimetre, square decimetre, square metre, are, hectare, square kilometre. The are sits between the square metre and the hectare, with 100 square metres below it and 100 ares above it. Pupils who understand the ladder can convert any land measure quickly.
A list of anchors
Remember a few values: 100 m² is 1 are, 250 m² is 2.5 ares, 500 m² is 5 ares, 1,000 m² is 10 ares, 5,000 m² is 50 ares and 10,000 m² is 100 ares. Between them you can interpolate. With these anchors you can read any plot size at a glance and use the converter above to confirm the exact figure, which a quick convert m² to ares will give in a second.
How land units shape the market
The unit in which land is sold shapes how buyers think. A price per are makes land look cheap, a price per hectare makes it look dear, and a price per square metre sits in between. Sellers choose the unit that suits their story, and buyers who convert everything to the same unit see through the framing. This is why a plain conversion page is useful for anyone who buys or sells plots across borders.
Belgian and Swiss notation
In Belgium and Switzerland, a plot is often written in hectares, ares and centiares: 0 ha 12 a 50 ca means 1,250 m². The centiare is one square metre. A buyer from abroad can read the three parts as 0, 12 and 50, and convert to square metres by multiplying hectares by 10,000, ares by 100 and adding centiares.
Bulgarian dekars and Turkish dönüms
A Bulgarian dekar is 1,000 m², 10 ares. A Turkish dönüm is also 1,000 m². A farm of 25 dekars is 25,000 m², which is 250 ares or 2.5 hectares. Eastern Mediterranean land sales use these units, so a conversion to ares is often needed.
Indian cents and guntas
In South India a cent is 40.47 m², 0.4047 are, and a guntha is 101.17 m², 1.01 ares. A plot of 5 cents is 202 m², 2 ares. A plot of 10 guntas is 1,012 m², 10.1 ares. These units show how close old measures can be to the metric are.
European old units in ares
A German Morgen was about 25 ares, a Danish tønde land 55 ares, a Swedish tunnland 49 ares, an Austro-Hungarian Joch 57.5 ares. A hold in Hungary equals 57.55 ares. Historians converting medieval land records usually go through square metres and then ares for a rough comparison with modern plots.
Estate planning in ares
A family that owns 3,000 m², 30 ares, and wants to leave a plot to each of three children can plan 10 ares each, 1,000 m². If a road takes 2 ares, each gets 9.3. Lawyers write deeds in square metres, while families talk in ares, so a conversion is part of every inheritance discussion.
Allotments and community gardens
A German allotment of 3 ares, 300 m², is typical. A Czech garden colony may have plots of 2 to 4 ares. A British allotment is about 2.5 ares, 250 m². Gardeners compare plot sizes across countries, and the are is the unit in which they are closest.
Parking spaces and garages
An are holds about 8 car spaces including aisles. A garage for 4 cars is about 0.5 are, 50 m². A parking lot for 60 cars is 7.5 ares, 750 m². Planners estimate lots by the are because the figure stays small, and a “convert m² to ares” calculation is a tool that connects the plot area with the number of cars.
More values for convert m² to ares
A longer list of conversions
If the value you need is not in the first list, these further conversions may be close enough to read off directly:
- 0.1 m² = 0.001 a
- 0.5 m² = 0.005 a
- 3 m² = 0.03 a
- 4 m² = 0.04 a
- 7 m² = 0.07 a
- 15 m² = 0.15 a
- 20 m² = 0.2 a
- 75 m² = 0.75 a
- 200 m² = 2 a
- 500 m² = 5 a
- 2,000 m² = 20 a
- 10,000 m² = 100 a
Mistakes when you convert m² to ares
Multiplying instead of dividing
The are is bigger, so the number shrinks. If 500 m² became 50,000, you multiplied.
Confusing are and acre
An acre is 4,047 m², about 40 ares. Do not read acre as are.
Moving the point one place
Move it two. If you moved it one, the answer is ten times too big.
Quick answers
How many ares in a square metre?
0.01.
How do I convert m² to ares?
Divide by 100.
What is 800 m² in ares?
8 ares.
How many ares in a hectare?
100.
Does my number leave my device?
No. The calculation runs in your browser.
Related pages and a last word
If you work with land and area, these conversions are close at hand: Convert m² to cm², Convert m² to ha, Convert km to mi, Convert mi to km, Convert °C to °F, Convert °F to °C, Convert mm to cm, Convert ft to dm, Convert mm³ to m³. The reverse of this page is Convert ares to m².
In short, to convert m² to ares divide by 100, remember that a hectare has 100 ares, and keep the unit next to the number. Your number stays on your device: nothing is uploaded and no account is needed.