Oil Barrels to Milliliters (bbl to mL)

1 oil barrel equals 158,987.2949 milliliters (rounded).

1 oil barrel = 158,987.2949 milliliters

How to convert oil barrels to milliliters

To convert oil barrels to milliliters, multiply the number of oil barrels by 158,987.2949. The factor is rounded to 10 significant digits. To go the other way, multiply milliliters by 0.00000628981077 (rounded).

milliliters = oil barrels × 158,987.2949

Example: 10 oil barrels = 1,589,872.949 milliliters.

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

Oil Barrel (bbl)

US customaryCurrent unit

Exactly 42 US gallons (158.987 L). The unit of crude oil trade since the 1860s Pennsylvania oil fields.

The oil barrel did not come from the oil industry's own design but from the barrels already lying around Pennsylvania. After Drake's well of 1859 started a boom, producers shipped crude in whatever containers were handy: whiskey barrels of around 40 gallons, plus 42 and 45 gallon casks. Buyers grew suspicious of the inconsistency, and around 1866 producers settled on the wine tierce of 42 gallons, two gallons bigger than the common whiskey barrel. An Oil City circular of August 1866 also promised an allowance of two gallons in every 40.

By 1872 the 42-gallon standard was firmly established, and US government bodies adopted it in 1882. The barrel is exactly 42 US gallons, about 159 liters, and remains the worldwide pricing unit for crude, even though many countries report volumes in cubic meters. EIA says Strait of Hormuz flows of 20 million barrels a day equal about a fifth of global consumption, implying roughly 100 million barrels a day. The abbreviation bbl has a disputed origin: a popular story links it to Standard Oil's blue barrels, but the abbreviation predates the oil industry.

1 oil barrel = 158.9872949 liters (approximately).

Sources: Wikipedia: Barrel (unit); NIST SP 811, Appendix B.8: conversion factors for volume; EIA: Today in Energy, Strait of Hormuz oil flows

Milliliter (mL)

Metric (SI)Current unit

One thousandth of a liter, or exactly 1 cubic centimeter. Used for medicine, cooking and small containers.

Milliliters inherit everything from the liter, since the prefix simply means one thousandth. Because the liter is a cubic decimeter, a milliliter works out to exactly one cubic centimeter, a coincidence the metric system built in on purpose so that volume, length and mass interlock. One milliliter of water has a mass of about one gram, so a dosing syringe, a kitchen scale and a measuring jug can all be checked against one another.

Today milliliters dominate wherever small amounts must be measured precisely: medicine, flavorings, perfume, shampoo and the fine print on drink labels. Spelling is a mild regional split, with uppercase mL preferred in the United States, Canada and Australia and lowercase ml common in the UK and Europe. For scale, a US teaspoon is just under 5 mL, a US tablespoon is about 14.8 mL, and the US nutrition-label cup is exactly 240 mL, so one such cup is 240 of these tiny units.

1 milliliter = 0.001 liters (exactly).

Sources: Wikipedia: Litre; NIST SP 811, Appendix B.8: conversion factors for volume; 21 CFR 101.9: nutrition labeling household measures

Related conversions

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