US Legal Cups to Milliliters (cup (legal) to mL)

1 US legal cup equals 240 milliliters exactly.

1 US legal cup = 240 milliliters

How to convert US legal cups to milliliters

To convert US legal cups to milliliters, multiply the number of US legal cups by 240. This factor is exact. To go the other way, multiply milliliters by 0.004166666667 (rounded).

milliliters = US legal cups × 240

Example: 10 US legal cups = 2,400 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

US Legal Cup (cup (legal))

US customaryCurrent unit

Exactly 240 mL, the 'cup' defined by US food-labeling law.

Nutrition labels in the United States do not use the traditional cup. Federal law, tied to FDA labelling rules, defines the legal cup as exactly 240 mL, which is a round metric figure sitting close to the customary cup of 8 US fluid ounces (about 236.6 mL, as NIST lists it). The difference is about 1.4 percent, small enough to matter little for a serving size.

The metric cup of 250 mL, used in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and some other countries, is a separate, slightly larger measure, and the legal cup is about 0.96 of it. Older cups varied far more. The Japanese go was about 180 mL and was legally defined in 1891, the Russian stakan about 246 mL and the Dutch kopje about 150 mL. An 1894 British book described a cup as about 6 imperial fluid ounces. Without a stated standard, a recipe cup can therefore differ noticeably from country to country.

1 US legal cup = 0.24 liters (exactly).

Sources: Wikipedia: Cup (unit); NIST Guide to the SI, Appendix B.8: conversion factors

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

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