Turn a height in centimeters into feet and inches, or enter feet and inches to get centimeters. Includes a chart of common heights from 150 to 200 cm.
Height is the measurement people convert most, and it’s awkward because feet and inches are two numbers while centimeters is one. Driver’s licenses, sports rosters and dating profiles in the US use feet and inches, but passports from most countries, medical records and clothing size charts often use cm. Enter centimeters to get feet and inches, or fill in the feet and inches boxes to go back to cm.
How do I convert cm to feet and inches?
Divide the centimeters by 2.54 to get total inches. Then divide by 12: the whole number is feet and the remainder is inches. For example, 175 cm ÷ 2.54 = 68.9 inches, and 68.9 ÷ 12 = 5 with 8.9 left over, so 175 cm is 5 ft 8.9 in, which most people would call 5’9″.
Cm to feet formula
cm = (feet × 12 + inches) × 2.54
The inch has been defined as exactly 2.54 cm since 1959, so this conversion has no rounding baked in. One foot is therefore exactly 30.48 cm.
Height chart: cm to feet and inches
| Centimeters | Feet and inches | Total inches | Decimal feet |
|---|---|---|---|
| 150 cm | 4 ft 11.1 in | 59.1 in | 4.92 ft |
| 155 cm | 5 ft 1 in | 61 in | 5.09 ft |
| 160 cm | 5 ft 3 in | 63 in | 5.25 ft |
| 165 cm | 5 ft 5 in | 65 in | 5.41 ft |
| 170 cm | 5 ft 6.9 in | 66.9 in | 5.58 ft |
| 175 cm | 5 ft 8.9 in | 68.9 in | 5.74 ft |
| 180 cm | 5 ft 10.9 in | 70.9 in | 5.91 ft |
| 185 cm | 6 ft 0.8 in | 72.8 in | 6.07 ft |
| 190 cm | 6 ft 2.8 in | 74.8 in | 6.23 ft |
| 195 cm | 6 ft 4.8 in | 76.8 in | 6.4 ft |
| 200 cm | 6 ft 6.7 in | 78.7 in | 6.56 ft |
Decimal feet aren’t feet and inches
This trips up a lot of people. 5.75 ft is not 5 ft 7.5 in; it’s 5 ft 9 in, because 0.75 of a foot is 9 inches. So if a site lists a height as 5.8 ft, that’s about 5 ft 9.6 in. The calculator shows both forms so you don’t mix them up.
How to use the Cm to Feet Converter
Enter centimeters
Type a height in cm. The feet and inches boxes fill in automatically.
Or enter feet and inches
Type feet and inches instead, and the cm box updates to match.
Read the height
See the height in feet and inches, total inches, decimal feet and meters.
Why is an inch exactly 2.54 centimeters?
The inch has been defined from the meter since the Mendenhall Order of 1893, when the United States began defining its yard as 3600/3937 meter. That made the US inch about 2.540005 cm. Britain used a slightly different physical standard, so inches in the two countries did not quite match, a real problem for precision manufacturing.
Industry in several countries had already started using 25.4 millimeters as a practical inch in the 1930s. The International Yard and Pound Agreement of 1959 made it official: one yard equals exactly 0.9144 meter, so one inch equals exactly 2.54 cm and one foot equals exactly 30.48 cm.
The old value lived on in land surveying as the US survey foot, which is 2 parts per million longer. The National Institute of Standards and Technology retired it after December 31, 2022. For a person’s height the difference is far smaller than a hair, but it mattered over long survey distances.
For other small lengths you can use the inches to cm converter or the feet to meters converter, which rely on the same exact factors.
How do you measure your height accurately at home?
Clinics use a stadiometer, a vertical ruler with a sliding headpiece. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention describes its standard method in the measurement manuals for the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). You can copy most of it with a wall, a hardcover book and a tape measure.
- Take off shoes and hair accessories, and stand on a hard floor, not carpet.
- Stand with heels together, and let the back of your heels, buttocks, shoulder blades and head touch the wall if they can.
- Look straight ahead so your head is in the Frankfort horizontal plane: an imaginary line from the lower edge of the eye socket to the top of the ear opening is level with the floor.
- Take a deep breath and stand tall while a helper slides the book down until it rests flat on your head.
- Mark the wall under the book and measure to the nearest 0.1 cm.
Most people are slightly taller in the morning, so measure at a consistent time. An accurate height also improves results from the BMI calculator.
Frequently asked questions
How tall is 170 cm in feet?
170 cm is about 5 ft 6.9 in, which rounds to 5’7″.
How many cm is 6 feet?
Six feet is exactly 182.88 cm.
What is 5'10" in cm?
5 ft 10 in is 70 inches, and 70 × 2.54 = 177.8 cm.
How many cm are in a foot?
Exactly 30.48 cm, since one foot is 12 inches of 2.54 cm each.
Should I round my height up or down?
Round to the nearest inch. 5 ft 8.4 in is 5’8″, and 5 ft 8.5 in or more rounds to 5’9″.
Sources and further reading
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Last reviewed: October 2026