Height on documents and forms
Passports, driving licences and medical records use whichever system the issuing country uses. Someone recorded as 178 cm is 5 ft 10 in to the nearest inch — a form that only accepts feet and inches forces the rounding.
Length
Convert cm to feet
1 centimeter equals 0.032808399 feet. Enter a value below to convert instantly.
Centimetres to feet is overwhelmingly a height conversion: a number given in centimetres on a passport, medical record or sports profile, and a reader who thinks in feet and inches. The wrinkle is that the answer is almost never wanted in decimal feet — it is wanted as feet plus inches.
1 cm
0.032808399 ft
Multiply the number of centimeters by 0.0328083989501 to get feet. How this is calculated
Need the other direction? Convert foot to centimeter →
Formula
Multiply the number of centimeters by 0.0328083989501 to get feet.
Step by step
- Start with 1 cm.
- Multiply by the conversion factor 0.0328083989501.
- 1 × 0.0328083989501 = 0.032808399 ft.
Centimeters to Feet conversion table
| Centimeters (cm) | Feet (ft) |
|---|---|
| 1 | 0.032808399 |
| 2 | 0.065616798 |
| 3 | 0.098425197 |
| 5 | 0.16404199 |
| 10 | 0.32808399 |
| 20 | 0.65616798 |
| 50 | 1.6404199 |
| 100 | 3.2808399 |
| 500 | 16.404199 |
| 1,000 | 32.808399 |
Where centimeters and feet are used together
Sports rosters and profiles
Player heights appear in centimetres in European leagues and in feet and inches in North American ones, so the same athlete has two published heights. They usually differ slightly because each league rounds to its own nearest unit.
Furniture and fixture heights
Worktop, desk and shelf heights are specified in centimetres by most manufacturers and in inches by US ones. A 90 cm counter is 2 ft 11.4 in — just under the US standard 36 inch counter, which is why imported appliances can sit slightly proud.
Ride and equipment height limits
Minimum height requirements at theme parks, and maximum heights for vehicles and doorways, are posted in local units. Converting tells a visiting family whether a 122 cm limit clears a child measured at 4 ft 1 in — it does, by about a centimetre.
Everyday centimeters worth knowing
Values people actually look up, with the reason each one comes up. Every figure is calculated with the same engine as the converter above.
| Centimeter (cm) | Foot (ft) | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| 30.48 | 1 | Exactly one foot |
| 100 | 3.2808399 | One metre |
| 122 | 4.0026247 | A common theme-park height limit |
| 152 | 4.9868766 | About 5 feet |
| 165 | 5.4133858 | A common adult height |
| 175 | 5.7414698 | A common adult height |
| 183 | 6.003937 | About 6 feet |
| 200 | 6.5616798 | A tall doorway |
How these two units are defined
A centimetre is one hundredth of a metre; a foot is exactly 0.3048 metres, so one foot is exactly 30.48 centimetres. The reason this conversion feels awkward is not the factor but the format: metric heights are a single number, while Imperial heights are a compound of two units. Any conversion between them has to handle that mismatch explicitly.
Rounding and precision
Heights are rarely known better than the nearest centimetre or half-inch, so a converted height should be rounded to the nearest inch and nothing finer. Be aware that rounding to the nearest inch changes the number by up to 1.3 cm, which is why a person listed as 5 ft 10 in might measure anywhere from 177.2 to 179.7 cm. The decimal feet shown here are an intermediate step, not the form you should quote a height in.
Mistakes people make with this conversion
-
Reading 5.75 feet as 5 feet 7.5 inches
It is 5 feet 9 inches. Decimal feet are tenths and hundredths of a foot; converting the decimal part means multiplying by 12, not reading it as inches.
-
Converting the feet and forgetting the inches
5 ft 9 in is not 5 × 30.48. Fold the inches into the feet first (9 ÷ 12 = 0.75 ft), then convert 5.75 ft.
-
Double-rounding a height
Rounding to the nearest inch, then converting back and rounding again to the nearest centimetre, can shift a height by two or three centimetres. Convert once from the original measurement.
Read more about these units
Sources for this page
Content on this page last reviewed 12 August 2026. Spotted an error? Report it — see also how these values are calculated.
Convert Centimeter to other length units
1 cm expressed in every other length unit on this site.
- Meter m 0.01
- Kilometer km 0.00001
- Hectometer hm 0.0001
- Dekameter dam 0.001
- Decimeter dm 0.1
- Centimeter cm 1
- Millimeter mm 10
- Micrometer µm 10,000
- Nanometer nm 10,000,000
- Picometer pm 10,000,000,000
- Femtometer fm 10,000,000,000,000
- Attometer am 1e+16
- Megameter Mm 1e-8
- Gigameter Gm 1e-11
- Terameter Tm 1e-14
- Petameter Pm 1e-17
- Exameter Em 1e-20
- Angstrom Å 100,000,000
- Mile mi 0.0000062137119
- Yard yd 0.010936133
- Foot ft 0.032808399
- Inch in 0.39370079
- Kiloyard kyd 0.000010936133
- League lea 0.0000020712373
- Furlong fur 0.000049709695
- Chain ch 0.00049709695
- Rod rd 0.0019883878
- Perch perch 0.0019883878
- Pole pole 0.0019883878
- Rope rope 0.0016404199
- Fathom fath 0.0054680665
- Link li 0.049709695
- Hand hand 0.098425197
- Ell ell 0.0087489064
- Barleycorn barleycorn 1.1811024
- Mil mil 393.70079
- Microinch µin 393,700.79
- Caliber cl 39.370079
- Centiinch cin 39.370079
- Nautical Mile nmi 0.000005399568
- Nautical Mile (UK) NM (UK) 0.0000053961182
- Nautical League nl 0.000001799856
- Nautical League (UK) nl (UK) 0.0000017987061
- Mile (US survey) mi (US) 0.0000062136995
- Furlong (US survey) fur (US) 0.000049709596
- Chain (US survey) ch (US) 0.00049709596
- Rod (US survey) rd (US) 0.0019883838
- Fathom (US survey) fath (US) 0.0054680556
- Foot (US survey) ft (US) 0.032808333
- Link (US survey) li (US) 0.049709596
- Inch (US survey) in (US) 0.3937
- League (statute) st.league 0.0000020712332
- Pica pica 2.3622047
- Point pt 28.346457
- Twip twip 566.92913
- Light Year ly 1.0570008e-18
- Astronomical Unit AU 6.6845871e-14
- Parsec pc 3.2407793e-19
- Kiloparsec kpc 3.2407793e-22
- Megaparsec Mpc 3.2407793e-25
- Earth's Equatorial Radius R⊕(eq) 1.5678559e-9
- Earth's Polar Radius R⊕(pol) 1.5731304e-9
- Earth's Distance from Sun d⊕☉ 6.684492e-14
- Sun's Radius R☉ 1.4374012e-11
- Bohr Radius a₀ 188,972,610
- Electron Radius (classical) rₑ 3,548,691,200,000
- Fermi F 10,000,000,000,000
- X-unit X 99,792,432,000
- Planck Length ℓP 6.1871425e+32
- Mile (Roman) mi (Rom) 0.0000067576517
- Roman Actus actus 0.0002818591
- Arpent arpent 0.00017087708
- Cubit (UK) cubit 0.021872266
- Cubit (Greek) cubit (Gk) 0.021608166
- Long Cubit long cubit 0.018747657
- Reed reed 0.0036453777
- Long Reed long reed 0.0031246094
- Span (cloth) span 0.043744532
- Finger (cloth) finger 0.087489064
- Nail (cloth) nail 0.17497813
- Handbreadth handbreadth 0.1312336
- Fingerbreadth fingerbreadth 0.52493438
- Aln aln 0.016841317
- Famn famn 0.0056137725
- Ken ken 0.0047206329
- Russian Archin archin 0.014060742
- Vara Castellana vara (cast) 0.011973868
- Vara Conuquera vara (con) 0.0039912894
- Vara de Tarea vara (tarea) 0.0039912894
- Ja (Korean foot) 자 0.033
- Chi 치 0.33
- Pun 푼 3.3
- Gan 간 0.0055
- Jang 장 0.0033
- Ri (Korean) 리 0.000025462963
About the centimeter
The centimeter (cm) is a SI unit of length.
About the foot
The foot (ft) is a Imperial unit of length.
Related conversions
Frequently asked questions
What is 170 cm in feet and inches?
170 cm is 5.5774 feet, which is 5 feet and 0.5774 × 12 = 6.9 inches — so 5 ft 7 in to the nearest inch. The dedicated height converter shows the feet-and-inches breakdown directly.
How do theme-park height limits in centimetres compare with feet and inches?
A 122 cm minimum is 4.003 feet — 4 ft 0 in almost exactly. Limits are set as round numbers in the local system, so a 4-foot limit elsewhere is 121.92 cm: the same rule, and a child measured right at the line can pass one and fail the other.
Why does the same person have two different published heights?
Each system rounds to its own nearest unit. A height measured at 177.5 cm rounds to 178 cm metrically and to 5 ft 10 in Imperially, and converting 5 ft 10 in back gives 177.8 cm. The gap is rounding, not disagreement.
How many feet are in a centimeter?
One centimeter equals 0.032808399 feet.
How do you convert centimeters to feet?
Multiply the number of centimeters by 0.0328083989501 to get feet.
What is 1 foot in centimeters?
One foot equals 30.48 centimeters.
When would I convert centimeters to feet?
This conversion is common when measuring height, screen sizes, travel distances, fabric, and construction dimensions.