What next?
Area is the number most material quantities are priced from.
How to use this converter
- Enter a value and pick the unit to convert from.
- Choose the unit to convert to.
- Read the result and the full equation.
Metric and imperial, side by side
Property listings, land and floor plans mix square metres, square feet, acres and hectares freely — so one figure often has to be re-expressed several ways. This converter keeps the exact factors so a floor area or plot size reads correctly in any unit.
One acre is 4,046.86 m² and one hectare is exactly 10,000 m² (100 m × 100 m), which is why a hectare is roughly 2.47 acres — a handy figure for land.
What your result means
The converted figure is the same piece of ground measured with a different ruler — nothing about the land changes, only the unit. Because area is a squared quantity, the conversion factor is squared too: a metre is 3.28 feet, but a square metre is 10.76 square feet, not 3.28. That squaring is where most mental arithmetic goes wrong.
Treat the decimals with suspicion rather than confidence. An acre is defined as exactly 4,046.8564224 m², so a plot quoted as "half an acre" was almost certainly rounded before you started, and converting it back gives false precision. For land registry, planning or flooring quotes, round your answer to the precision of the least precise measurement you put in — usually three significant figures is honest, and anything beyond that is decoration.
Why this one is different
Rounding is yours to set, and on area it earns its place: squaring a length doubles the effect of any error in it, so a figure rounded before it is squared drifts twice as fast. Full precision keeps the arithmetic exact and the rounding happens once, at the end, where you can see it.
Area scales with the square, which is where estimates go wrong
Doubling the length of a room does not double the paint. One metre is 3.281 feet, so one square metre is 3.281 squared — 10.764 square feet. Applying the linear factor to an area is the most common conversion error in building estimates, and it understates the answer by a factor of more than three.
The same square law makes small measurement errors expensive. Measuring a 4 by 5 metre room 10 cm long on each side gives 4.1 by 5.1, which is 20.91 m² against 20 — a 4.5 percent overrun before any waste allowance. On tiles or flooring sold by the pack, that is often a whole extra pack.
For land, the anchors are that a hectare is 10,000 m² and an acre is 4,047 m², so an acre is a little over 0.4 of a hectare and a hectare is about two and a half acres. An acre was originally the area a yoked pair of oxen could plough in a day, which is why it is an awkward 4,840 square yards rather than a round number of anything.
Frequently asked questions
How many square feet are in a square metre?＋
One square metre equals about 10.764 square feet. Multiply square metres by 10.764 to get square feet, or divide the other way.
Is an acre bigger than a hectare?＋
No. A hectare (10,000 m²) is larger — about 2.47 acres. An acre is roughly 4,047 m².
How do I convert an area, not a length?＋
Area scales with the square of the length ratio. One metre is 3.281 feet, so one square metre is 3.281 squared, about 10.764 square feet. Multiplying by 3.281 once is the most common conversion mistake.
How big is an acre in practical terms?＋
An acre is 4,840 square yards, or roughly 4,047 square metres. A standard football pitch is a little larger than half a hectare, or about 1.3 acres.
Which unit should I use for a room or a floor plan?＋
Square metres in most of the world, square feet in the US and in UK property listings. Measure in the unit you will quote in, so rounding happens once rather than twice.
Does the converter handle very large or very small values?＋
Yes. Results switch to a compact notation at the extremes so a square kilometre and a square millimetre both stay readable.
Related converters
Conversion reference
Area factors are the square of the corresponding length factors, which is why they look unfamiliar.
An acre was originally the area a yoke of oxen could plough in a day — which is why it is an awkward 4,840 square yards rather than a round number.
Worked example
A 1,200 sq ft flat in square metres:
1,200 × 0.09290304
= 111.48 m²
A useful sanity check: divide square feet by about 10.76 to get square metres, or by 10 for a rough figure that is 7% too high.
Assumptions & limitations
Area conversion is exact, but the units themselves carry ambiguity:
- Area scales with the square of length. Doubling a room's dimensions quadruples its area — the single most common source of error here.
- Property "floor area" is measured differently by different conventions: gross internal, net internal and gross external areas can differ by 10% or more for the same building.
- This converter uses the international acre (4,840 sq yd). Scottish and Irish acres were historically larger and are obsolete.
- For land, 1 hectare = 2.471 acres is the conversion worth memorising.