Liters to US Liquid Barrels (L to bbl (US))

1 liter equals 0.008386414361 US liquid barrels (rounded).

1 liter = 0.008386414361 US liquid barrels

How to convert liters to US liquid barrels

To convert liters to US liquid barrels, multiply the number of liters by 0.008386414361. The factor is rounded to 10 significant digits. To go the other way, multiply US liquid barrels by 119.2404712 (rounded).

US liquid barrels = liters × 0.008386414361

Example: 10 liters = 0.08386414361 US liquid barrels.

Pints, quarts, gallons and fluid ounces differ between the US and the UK. Units are labeled 'US' or 'imperial' to avoid confusion.

About these units

Liter (L)

Metric (SI)Current unit

One cubic decimeter (1,000 cm³). The everyday metric unit of volume for drinks, fuel and cooking.

The liter was born in revolutionary France. In 1795 it was introduced as a republican unit and defined as one cubic decimeter, while the gram was tied to a cubic centimeter of water. The name comes from the older French litron, itself descended from a Byzantine Greek unit of weight, not volume. A small revision of the decimeter in 1798 left the first liter about 1.000974 of today's cubic decimeter, and in 1879 the international metric authorities adopted the liter with the symbol l.

The liter then took a strange detour. In 1901 it was redefined as the space taken up by one kilogram of pure water at its densest, which made it about 1.000028 cubic decimeters, and that muddled definition lasted until 1964, when it was restored to exactly one cubic decimeter. A capital L was added as an alternative symbol in 1979 because a lowercase l is easy to mistake for the digit 1, and NIST says L is the symbol to use in the United States. A liter of water is close to a kilogram, which is why a one-liter bottle feels like a kilo in the hand.

The liter is the reference unit for volume on this site.

Sources: Wikipedia: Litre; NIST Guide to the SI, Chapter 5: units outside the SI

US Liquid Barrel (bbl (US))

US customaryTraditional unit (still used in some regions)

31.5 US gallons (119.24 L). The standard US barrel for liquids such as beer.

Most American fluid barrels are set at 31.5 US gallons, which works out to about 119 litres (119.24 L as used here). That is a half of the old 63 gallon wine hogshead, so the liquid barrel is a direct descendant of the English wine-gallon system rather than of any grain measure. Beer is the best known use, though the common US beer keg barrel is slightly smaller at 31 gallons, about 117 litres.

The English name came from French baril. Colonial and later American law treated the barrel as a trade unit for wine, beer, cider and spirits, but other liquids, from molasses to petroleum, were sold in containers of other sizes, so the phrase barrel never meant a single universal amount.

Confusion with its neighbours is common. It is roughly 3 percent larger than the dry barrel of 7,056 cubic inches, and well short of the 42 gallon barrel used for oil. The 63 gallon hogshead is exactly twice its size.

1 US liquid barrel = 119.2404712 liters (approximately).

Sources: Wikipedia: Barrel (unit); Wikipedia: Hogshead

Related conversions

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