Convert m³ to ft³ cubic metres ↔ cubic feet Free Online Secure
Type a value in cubic metres and read it in cubic feet 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 m³ to ft³ (cubic metres ↔ cubic feet)
| m³ | ft³ |
|---|---|
| 1 | 35.3146667215 |
| 2 | 70.629333443 |
| 3 | 105.944000164 |
| 5 | 176.573333607 |
| 10 | 353.146667215 |
| 20 | 706.29333443 |
| 50 | 1765.73333607 |
| 100 | 3531.46667215 |
Where these units come from
The litre has an awkward history. From 1901 it was defined as the volume of one kilogram of pure water at its densest, which sounds elegant but came out at 1.000028 cubic decimetres — close enough to be confusing and far enough to spoil careful work. In 1964 the definition was abandoned and the litre became exactly one cubic decimetre, which it has been ever since. The gallon has a messier story still: the US gallon descends from the English wine gallon of 231 cubic inches, while Britain redefined its own in 1824 as the volume of ten pounds of water. Nobody reconciled the two, so a US gallon is 3.785411784 litres and an imperial gallon 4.54609 — about a fifth larger. The gallon, pint, cup, fluid ounce and spoons on this page are the US ones.
Where you meet them
Millilitres and litres run through daily life almost invisibly: bottles, fuel, paint, dosage, the capacity of a kettle. Cubic metres belong to water bills, concrete, shipping and the air a ventilation system has to move. Cubic centimetres name engine displacement, cubic feet appear in freight and in appliance capacities, and cups and spoons live almost entirely in recipes — which is exactly where the difference between a US cup and a metric one quietly ruins a cake.
Questions people ask
How many litres are in a cubic metre?
1000, since a cubic metre is a cube of ten decimetres on each side, and a litre is one cubic decimetre. A cubic metre of water weighs about a tonne. Water and gas consumption are billed in cubic metres, and a bath of 150 litres is therefore 0.15 of one.
Where are cubic feet used?
In the United States for natural gas billing, refrigerator and freezer capacity, and the interior volume of shipping containers, and worldwide for airflow, where fans are rated in cubic feet per minute. A cubic foot is exactly 28.316846592 litres, so a small fridge of 4 cubic feet holds about 113 litres.
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.
Containers, moving trucks and refrigerators: cubic metres into cubic feet
A 20-foot shipping container holds about 33 cubic metres. A 26-foot moving truck advertises roughly 1,700 cubic feet. A fridge in an American showroom is labelled 25 cu ft, and a storage unit is sold by the footprint but filled by volume. Anyone shipping goods across the Atlantic, moving house between countries or buying a US appliance for a European kitchen meets both units at once. To convert m³ to ft³, multiply by 35.3147: 1 m³ is 35.31 ft³, 10 m³ is 353.1 ft³ and 33 m³ is 1,165 ft³. The calculator above multiplies as you type, and the sections below show what the numbers mean for freight, storage and the home.
You will find the rule with worked examples, a short profile of each unit, a comparison, a long set of practical cases from shipping, moving and household goods, and the slips to avoid. All arithmetic runs in your browser, and what you type is not sent anywhere.
How to convert m³ to ft³: multiply by 35.3147
The rule
One foot is exactly 0.3048 metres, so one cubic foot is 0.0283168 cubic metres, and one cubic metre is 35.3147 cubic feet. To convert m³ to ft³, multiply the cubic metres by 35.3147. So 2 m³ is 70.63 ft³, 5 m³ is 176.57 ft³ and 0.25 m³ is 8.83 ft³. To go the other way, multiply cubic feet by 0.0283168.
Worked examples
A room of 32 m³ has 1,130 ft³. A wardrobe of 1.5 m³ has 53 ft³. A van load of 12 m³ has 424 ft³. A pallet of 1.44 m³ has 50.9 ft³, and a warehouse bay of 500 m³ has 17,657 ft³.
What the factor tells you
The cubic foot is a small unit, about 28 litres, so the number of cubic feet is always more than thirty-five times the number of cubic metres. A box about 30 cm on each edge is roughly one cubic foot, and about thirty-five such boxes make a cubic metre.
A quick sanity test
Your cubic feet figure must be well above thirty-five times the cubic metres. If it is smaller, you divided instead of multiplying.
The cubic metre
The SI unit of volume
The cubic metre is the volume of a cube one metre on each side. Freight forwarders call it CBM, and use it to price bulky shipments, fill containers and check pallet loads.
Where it appears
Shipping manifests, container specifications, warehouse plans and European product sheets.
The cubic foot
A cube twelve inches on each side
The cubic foot is the everyday volume unit in the United States for appliances, car trunks, moving trucks, bags of soil and storage units. It equals 1,728 cubic inches.
Where it appears
Appliance labels, moving truck rentals, garden centres and storage companies.
Cubic metres against cubic feet
One cubic metre equals 35.31 cubic feet, so a 33 m³ container is roughly 1,165 ft³ and a 600 L fridge is about 21 ft³. American product sheets look bigger because the unit is smaller, and a buyer who forgets the factor may think a US appliance is thirty-five times larger than it is.
The factor is exact in practice, because the foot is defined as 0.3048 m. Rounding only happens in the answer you display.
Where the conversion shows up
Shipping containers
A 20-foot container has about 33.2 m³ of internal volume, which is 1,172 ft³. A 40-foot container has about 67.7 m³, or 2,390 ft³, and a 40-foot high-cube has about 76 m³, roughly 2,684 ft³. American carriers and brokers may quote cubic feet, while European customers think in cubic metres, so the “convert m³ to ft³” calculation step turns up in nearly every quote.
Moving trucks and storage units
A 15-foot rental truck lists about 764 ft³, which is 21.6 m³. A 26-foot truck lists about 1,682 ft³, which is 47.6 m³. A storage unit of 10 by 10 feet with an 8 foot ceiling holds 800 ft³, or 22.7 m³. Moving companies in Europe estimate loads in cubic metres, so a customer relocating needs to put the two on one scale.
Appliances
A US refrigerator of 18 ft³ holds 510 litres, 0.51 m³. A 25 ft³ side-by-side holds 708 litres. A European fridge-freezer of 400 litres equals 14.1 ft³. Washers of 4.5 ft³ equal 127 litres. Appliance capacity is an internal measure, so fitting the product through a door depends on the outside dimensions.
Volumetric weight in air freight
Air carriers charge by the greater of actual weight and volumetric weight. The usual formula is one cubic metre per 167 kg, or 6,000 cm³ per kilogram. One cubic foot therefore counts as 4.72 kg. A parcel of 3 ft³ is billed as 14.2 kg even if it weighs 4 kg. Shippers who get a quote in cubic feet use the “convert m³ to ft³” calculation figure to see whether a European rate in kilograms matches.
Small parcels
Some US postal services price small parcels by cubic footage, with tiers up to a half cubic foot. A half cubic foot is 14.2 litres, 0.0142 m³, about the size of a large shoebox. European postal rates mostly use weight and the sum of dimensions. A seller who ships from Europe to the US can use the “convert m³ to ft³” calculation figure to tell which tier a box will land in.
Archive boxes and offices
A standard archive box holds about 1.2 ft³, which is 34 litres. A records room with 1,000 boxes occupies 1,200 ft³ of box volume, or 34 m³, before shelving and aisles. Records managers measure archives in cubic feet in the US and in linear metres of shelf in Europe, so the figures are usually converted via the box.
Camping and backpacks
Backpacks are rated in litres in Europe and sometimes in cubic inches in the US. A 65-litre pack has 2.3 ft³ or 3,967 in³. A tent of 4 m³ interior has 141 ft³. Sleeping bags stuff to 10 to 15 litres. Because gear is carried by volume, the conversion decides whether the bag you saw online fits what you plan to pack.
Waste and dumpsters
A 20-yard dumpster, a typical US size, holds 540 ft³, or 15.3 m³. A 10-yard one holds 270 ft³, about 7.6 m³. European skips come in 3, 6 and 8 m³ sizes. Waste carriers charge by size and by weight, so an American quote of 20 yards needs the “convert m³ to ft³” calculation figure and a yard-to-foot step of 27 to compare with a skip in cubic metres.
Spreadsheet formulas
Put cubic metres in column A and use =A2*35.3147 in column B. For the reverse, use =B2*0.0283168. Add a header with the unit, because a volume column without a unit is a common source of errors. A third column that divides the volume by 1.2 for pallet fill, or by a box size, gives a count quickly.
Rounding and precision
The factor 35.3147 is accurate to six figures. For freight, round to the nearest cubic foot, as carriers do. For appliances, one decimal is plenty. For scientific work, keep the factor 35.31466672. A result such as 1,165.38 ft³ for 33 m³ will be quoted as 1,165 ft³ on a quote and as 1,170 ft³ on a brochure.
A mental shortcut
Multiply by 35 and add one per cent. For 20 m³, 20 times 35 is 700, plus 7 gives 707, close to the exact 706.3. For 100 m³, 3,500 plus 35 gives 3,535, against 3,531.5. For a quick check on a shipping quote the shortcut is accurate enough, and it avoids opening a calculator in a meeting.
A picture to keep in mind
Picture a cardboard box 30 cm on each edge. About thirty-five of those boxes fill one cubic metre. If your “convert m³ to ft³” calculation answer suggests far more or far fewer boxes than that, repeat the calculation before you act on it.
Reference ladder
0.1 m³ is 3.53 ft³. 0.5 m³ is 17.7 ft³. 1 m³ is 35.3 ft³. 5 m³ is 176.6 ft³. 10 m³ is 353.1 ft³. 33 m³ is 1,165 ft³. 50 m³ is 1,765.7 ft³. 100 m³ is 3,531.5 ft³. Keep the ladder handy for quick checks on quotes and floor plans.
Checking by reversing
To check any convert m³ to ft³ result, multiply it by 0.0283168 and see whether you return to the start. If 10 m³ became 353.15 ft³, then 353.15 times 0.0283168 gives 10.00. A second test is the size of the number: it should be a little over thirty-five times larger than the cubic metre figure.
Pallets
A common US pallet of 48 by 40 inches loaded to 60 inches high holds about 66.7 ft³, which is 1.89 m³. A European pallet of 1.2 by 0.8 metres loaded to 1.5 metres holds 1.44 m³, which is 50.9 ft³. A 40-foot container takes about 20 US pallets or 23 European ones when floor-loaded, though stacking changes the count. Quotes may state pallets, volume or both.
Cold storage
A cold room of 5 by 4 by 3 metres has 60 m³ of space, which is 2,119 ft³. US vendors rate cold rooms and walk-in coolers by cubic feet, and European ones by cubic metres or pallet places. Usable space is smaller than gross volume, often by a third or more once aisles and air circulation are allowed for.
Home freezers and ovens
A chest freezer of 7 ft³ holds 198 litres, a microwave of 1.1 ft³ holds 31 litres, and a wall oven of 5 ft³ holds 142 litres. A dryer drum of 7.4 ft³ has 210 litres. Appliance capacities are stated in internal volume, and they can be compared directly with European litre figures after the conversion.
Air cargo containers
A standard air cargo container, such as an AKE unit, offers about 4.3 m³ of usable volume, roughly 152 ft³. A large pallet position on a freighter can hold 10 to 15 m³ depending on height. Air carriers publish both metric and imperial figures, and the volume decides the chargeable weight when the cargo is light.
Ships and cargo holds
Bulk carriers state hold capacity in cubic metres, but older US documents quote cubic feet. A grain hold of 20,000 m³ is 706,000 ft³. Bale capacity, for bagged or baled cargo, is lower than grain capacity because of the gaps. Surveyors who compare the two systems start with a simple factor and then adjust for how the cargo is packed.
Bookshelves and libraries
A library shelf of 1 metre holds about 30 to 35 average books. A stack room with 100 m³ of free volume cannot be filled to the last cubic foot, because shelving, aisles and fire rules cut the usable share. US library planners use cubic feet per volume, while European ones use linear metres of shelf, so the conversion is rarely direct.
Aquariums and tanks
A 55-gallon aquarium has about 7.35 ft³, or 208 litres. A pond liner kit for 2 m³ equals 70.6 ft³. In the US, tank sellers often give gallons, with cubic feet used for shipping boxes. A pond of 2 m³ needs about 70.6 ft³ of excavated space, which then has to be disposed of or reused in the garden.
Teaching the factor
A class can build a cube from twelve-inch rulers and a cube from metre sticks, then compare them. The metre cube is much bigger: 35.3 of the foot cubes would fill it. Pupils also learn why length ratios cube themselves. The foot is 30.48 per cent of a metre, but a cubic foot is only 2.83 per cent of a cubic metre.
Truck trailers
A 53-foot dry van trailer, the common US long-haul size, offers a cargo volume of roughly 3,800 to 4,000 ft³, about 108 to 113 m³. A European curtain-sider of 13.6 m has around 90 m³. Bulky, light cargo like furniture or foam fills a trailer by volume well before it reaches the weight limit, so haulage rates often depend on cubic metres or cubic feet rather than weight.
Car trunks and cargo space
A compact car with 15 ft³ of trunk has 425 litres, 0.425 m³. A mid-size SUV with 35 ft³ behind the rear seats offers 991 litres. Pickup beds are often given as about 50 ft³, which is 1.4 m³. European reviews use litres under the VDA method, American ones use cubic feet under SAE, and the two methods measure slightly differently, so a conversion gives an approximate comparison rather than an exact one.
Firewood and the cord
In the US and Canada, firewood is sold by the cord, a stack of 4 by 4 by 8 feet, or 128 ft³ in total. That is 3.62 m³ of stacked wood including gaps, with roughly 2.4 m³ of actual wood. European sellers use stacked cubic metres, called steres. One cord is about 3.6 steres. A buyer comparing offers can use the “convert m³ to ft³” calculation figure to get the price per stere.
Bagged soil and mulch
Garden centres in America sell soil in bags of 1, 2 or 3 cubic feet. A 2 ft³ bag holds 56.6 litres. A cubic yard of mulch is 27 ft³, or 0.765 m³. A garden bed of 3 m³ needs about 106 ft³ of soil, which is 53 bags of 2 ft³. Calculating how many bags are needed starts with the “convert m³ to ft³” calculation step, followed by a division by the bag size.
Grain and the bushel
A bushel is 1.2445 ft³, or 35.24 litres. A cubic metre of grain is about 28.4 bushels. Corn weighs about 56 pounds per bushel, so a cubic metre weighs close to 720 kg. Farm bins in the US are rated in bushels and in Europe in tonnes or cubic metres. The exact weight depends on moisture and variety, so the number is a guide.
Concrete by the bag
An 80-pound bag of concrete mix yields roughly 0.6 ft³ of concrete, which is 17 litres. A cubic metre of concrete therefore needs about 59 such bags. For a small slab of 0.5 m³ you would buy 30 bags. Larger pours use ready-mix by the cubic metre or cubic yard, and the “convert m³ to ft³” calculation step helps compare quotes from both sides of the ocean.
Rooms and houses
A room 12 by 12 feet with an 8-foot ceiling has 1,152 ft³, which is 32.6 m³. A house of 2,000 square feet with 8-foot ceilings has 16,000 ft³, or 453 m³. These volumes matter for heating and air-conditioning load, because the energy needed depends on the air in the room as well as the area.
More values for convert m³ to ft³
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 m³ = 3.53147 ft³
- 0.5 m³ = 17.6573 ft³
- 3 m³ = 105.944 ft³
- 4 m³ = 141.259 ft³
- 7 m³ = 247.203 ft³
- 15 m³ = 529.72 ft³
- 20 m³ = 706.293 ft³
- 75 m³ = 2,648.6 ft³
- 200 m³ = 7,062.93 ft³
- 500 m³ = 17,657.3 ft³
- 2,000 m³ = 70,629.3 ft³
- 10,000 m³ = 353,147 ft³
Common slips when you convert m³ to ft³
Using 3.28
3.28 is the factor for length, feet per metre. For volume you need its cube, 35.3147.
Dividing instead of multiplying
The cubic foot is the smaller unit, so the number must grow. If 10 m³ became 0.28, you divided.
Mixing gross and usable volume
A 33 m³ container does not take 33 m³ of mixed cargo. Pallets, gaps and bracing reduce the usable share.
Short answers
How many cubic feet are in a cubic metre?
35.3147.
How do I convert m³ to ft³?
Multiply by 35.3147.
How many cubic metres is a cubic foot?
0.0283168.
How much is 10 m³ in cubic feet?
353.15 ft³.
Does my number leave my device?
No, the calculation runs in your browser.
More pages and a wrap-up
For other volume conversions see Convert m³ to L, Convert m³ to cm³, Convert in³ to ft³, Convert L to ft³, Convert ft³ to yd³, Convert km to mi, Convert mi to km, Convert °C to °F, Convert °F to °C. The reverse direction is Convert ft³ to m³.
In short, a “convert m³ to ft³” calculation means multiplying by 35.3147 and writing the unit beside the answer. Your number is computed locally, with no account and no upload.