Convert between liters, gallons, cups, milliliters, and more
💡 Why This Matters Recipes, fuel economy, and lab measurements all use different volume units depending on where they come from. This tool converts instantly across the units you'll actually run into — metric and US customary alike.
Cups, pints, quarts, and gallons use US customary measurements.
The liter isn't officially part of the base SI unit system — it's a "non-SI unit accepted for use," derived from the cubic decimeter. It stuck around purely because it's convenient for everyday life.
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Every unit converts through milliliters as a common base, using fixed, standardized conversion factors. Your input is first converted to milliliters, then from milliliters to your target unit. Metric volume units (mL, L) scale by powers of 10; US customary cooking and liquid units (teaspoons, tablespoons, cups, pints, quarts, gallons) nest into each other by fixed multiples that aren't round in metric terms.
The result is the same physical volume, expressed in a different unit. This calculator uses US customary definitions for cups, pints, quarts, and gallons — the UK (imperial) versions of these units are noticeably different (a UK gallon is about 20% larger than a US gallon), so double-check which system a recipe or spec sheet is using before assuming a direct match.
Results are rounded for display. Converting a dry ingredient's volume to weight (or vice versa) additionally requires knowing that ingredient's density, which this calculator doesn't account for — a cup of flour and a cup of sugar don't weigh the same, even though they're the same volume.
Use this for scaling recipes between metric and US measurements, converting fuel economy figures, checking container or bottle sizes, or working through lab measurements that mix unit systems.
Example: Convert 1 liter to cups. One liter equals approximately 4.227 US cups, so 1 × 4.227 = 4.23 cups. Selecting Liters as your From unit and Cups as your To unit with a value of 1 gives you that same result directly.
One liter equals approximately 4.227 US cups. This is useful for converting recipes between metric and US measurements.
No — a US gallon is about 3.785 liters, while a UK (imperial) gallon is about 4.546 liters, roughly 20% larger. This calculator uses US customary units; UK recipes and fuel figures will need a different conversion.
One US teaspoon equals approximately 4.929 milliliters, commonly rounded to 5 mL in cooking and medicine dosing.
US recipes traditionally measure by volume (cups, tablespoons), while metric recipes often measure by weight (grams), which is actually more precise for baking. Volume conversions between the two systems require also knowing the ingredient's density for a fully accurate result.