Megapascals to Kilopascals (MPa to kPa)

1 megapascal equals 1,000 kilopascals exactly.

How to convert megapascals to kilopascals

To convert megapascals to kilopascals, multiply the number of megapascals by 1,000. This factor is exact. To go the other way, multiply kilopascals by 0.001.

kilopascals = megapascals × 1,000

Example: 10 megapascals = 10,000 kilopascals.

About these units

Megapascal (MPa)

Metric (SI)Current unit

One million pascals. Used for material strength and hydraulic pressure.

Engineers reach for the megapascal because the pascal is far too small for solid materials. It is the preferred unit in engineering for stiffness and for tensile or compressive strength, and stiffness figures go on to gigapascals: aluminium is given as 69 GPa, structural steel as 200 GPa, and diamond as 1,220 GPa.

Fluid systems live in the same range. One megapascal is 10 bar, so scuba tanks filled to about 200 bar sit at 20 MPa, and fixed industrial hydraulic machinery commonly working at around 300 bar runs at about 30 MPa. A kilobar, used in experimental petrology, is 100 MPa.

For comparison with units from the pounds-and-inches world, one psi is about 6.895 kPa, so a megapascal is about 145 psi.

1 megapascal = 1,000,000 pascals (exactly).

Sources: Wikipedia: Pascal (unit); Wikipedia: Bar (unit); Wikipedia: Pounds per square inch

Kilopascal (kPa)

Metric (SI)Current unit

1,000 pascals. Used for tire pressures, weather reports in many countries and engineering.

Kilopascal is the form of the pascal that most people actually use. The pascal itself is very small, so outside meteorology the kilopascal became the common choice in most fields, and it equals one centibar. Medical elastography reports tissue stiffness in kPa, and Canada reports atmospheric pressure in kPa rather than hectopascals.

A standard atmosphere is 101.325 kPa. In 1982 IUPAC recommended a different reference for chemistry, a standard pressure of exactly 100 kPa, which split the older convention of 1 atm into two competing standards.

Blood pressure shows how the units line up. One mmHg is 0.13332 kPa, and a normal reading is below about 16.0 kPa systolic and 10.7 kPa diastolic, the same thing as the familiar 120 over 80 in millimeters of mercury.

1 kilopascal = 1,000 pascals (exactly).

Sources: Wikipedia: Pascal (unit); Wikipedia: Standard atmosphere (unit); Wikipedia: Millimetre of mercury

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