Millilitres to Cups (mL to cups)
A US cup is exactly 236.5882365 mL, so cups = millilitres ÷ 236.5882365: 250 mL is 1.0567 cups, 500 mL is 2.1134 cups and 1,000 mL is 4.2268 cups. This page opens the converter on millilitres into cups whatever pair you converted last, answers as you type with no button to press, and prints the headline to twelve significant digits, so 250 mL reads 1.05668820943. Under the answer the same amount is listed in every common volume unit: litres, cubic metres, teaspoons, tablespoons, US fluid ounces, cups, pints, quarts and gallons, because a volume is easier to judge beside the units already in the recipe. The cup here is the US customary cup that American recipes mean, 8 US fluid ounces; the 250 mL metric cup and the 240 mL nutrition-label cup are different sizes, and the questions below give the arithmetic for both.
1 mL in every volume unit
Millilitres to cups, fluid ounces and tablespoons
Every figure is the converter's own output for that many millilitres, rounded for reading: cups to four decimal places, US fluid ounces and tablespoons to two. Only the 236.5882365 mL row is exact, and it is exact because that is the definition of a US cup.
| Millilitres | Cups (US) | Fluid ounces (US) | Tablespoons (US) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 15 mL | 0.0634 | 0.51 | 1.01 |
| 30 mL | 0.1268 | 1.01 | 2.03 |
| 50 mL | 0.2113 | 1.69 | 3.38 |
| 60 mL | 0.2536 | 2.03 | 4.06 |
| 100 mL | 0.4227 | 3.38 | 6.76 |
| 120 mL | 0.5072 | 4.06 | 8.12 |
| 125 mL | 0.5283 | 4.23 | 8.45 |
| 150 mL | 0.6340 | 5.07 | 10.14 |
| 200 mL | 0.8454 | 6.76 | 13.53 |
| 236.5882365 mL | 1.0000 | 8.00 | 16.00 |
| 240 mL | 1.0144 | 8.12 | 16.23 |
| 250 mL | 1.0567 | 8.45 | 16.91 |
| 300 mL | 1.2680 | 10.14 | 20.29 |
| 350 mL | 1.4794 | 11.83 | 23.67 |
| 400 mL | 1.6907 | 13.53 | 27.05 |
| 500 mL | 2.1134 | 16.91 | 33.81 |
| 600 mL | 2.5361 | 20.29 | 40.58 |
| 750 mL | 3.1701 | 25.36 | 50.72 |
| 1,000 mL | 4.2268 | 33.81 | 67.63 |
| 1,500 mL | 6.3401 | 50.72 | 101.44 |
| 2,000 mL | 8.4535 | 67.63 | 135.26 |
Common questions
- How many cups is 250 mL?
- 1.0567 cups, a little over one cup. The converter prints 1.05668820943 as the headline, because a US cup is 236.5882365 mL and 250 does not divide into it evenly. The amounts asked for next most often: 100 mL is 0.4227 cups, 120 mL is 0.5072 cups, 150 mL is 0.634 cups, 300 mL is 1.268 cups, 500 mL is 2.1134 cups and 1,000 mL is 4.2268 cups. Type any of them into the From box and the answer appears without pressing anything.
- How do I convert mL to cups myself?
- Divide by 236.5882365, or multiply by 0.00422675283773, which is the same operation. A US cup is a sixteenth of a US gallon, that gallon is exactly 231 cubic inches, and an inch is exactly 2.54 cm, so 236.5882365 mL is a definition rather than a measurement and the page carries all of its digits. Going the other way, multiply cups by 236.5882365. The Swap units button between the two boxes turns this page into a cups to millilitres converter without reloading it.
- Is a cup 236.5882365 mL, 240 mL or 250 mL?
- All three sizes are in use, and this page converts to the US customary cup of 236.5882365 mL, which is what an American recipe means. The metric cup used in Australia and New Zealand is exactly 250 mL, and the cup used for US nutrition labels is rounded to 240 mL. Neither of those is a separate unit in the menu here, so divide by 250 for a metric cup (250 mL is exactly 1 metric cup) or by 240 for a label cup (250 mL is 1.0417 of one). The gap matters most when a recipe scales: eight US cups is 1,892.705892 mL against 2,000 mL for eight metric cups.
- How many mL in a cup, half a cup and a quarter cup?
- One cup is 236.5882365 mL, three quarters is 177.441177375 mL, two thirds is 157.725491 mL, half is 118.29411825 mL, a third is 78.8627455 mL and a quarter is 59.147059125 mL. Kitchen jugs read those as roughly 237, 177, 158, 118, 79 and 59 mL. To get them from this page, press Swap units so cups feed millilitres, then type the fraction as a decimal: 0.75 rather than 3/4, since the field takes digits, one decimal point and an optional minus sign.
- Is there a UK or imperial cup?
- Not in this converter. The imperial units it carries are the fluid ounce at 28.4130625 mL, the pint at 568.26125 mL and the gallon at 4.54609 L, and the switch marked Show 5 more adds them alongside cubic inches and cubic feet. Older British recipes treat a cup as half an imperial pint, 284.130625 mL, which is 1.2009 US cups, so a US cup falls about a sixth short of one. Modern UK recipes weigh ingredients in grams instead.
- Does this work for flour, sugar or butter?
- As a volume, yes: millilitres and cups both measure the space something takes up, so 250 mL of flour and 250 mL of water are both 1.0567 cups. If the recipe gives grams and you want cups, that is a density question rather than a unit conversion, and the grams to cups tool answers it: it names the density it used and lists spooned and scooped flour separately. Water is the case where the two line up, since a millilitre of water weighs about a gram.
- Why so many decimal places, and how do I copy the number?
- Because millilitres rarely land on a whole number of cups: 1 mL is 0.00422675283773 cups. Results print to twelve significant digits with trailing zeros dropped, so 236.5882365 mL comes out as a clean 1 rather than 0.99999999, and you can round where you want. The Copy result button copies the figure exactly as printed but without the thousands separators, so it pastes straight into a spreadsheet.
- Does anything I type leave my browser?
- No. The conversion is one division against a table of factors that ships with the page, so there is no upload and no account, and it keeps working with no network connection once the page has loaded. The amount you typed is kept in your own browser storage so the field is where you left it next time, the Start over button at the top of the page clears it, and opening this page on millilitres to cups does not disturb the pair the main converter remembers.
Conversion factors are the exact legal definitions where one exists. An inch is exactly 2.54 cm and a pound exactly 0.45359237 kg, so those conversions are exact rather than approximate. Temperature uses offsets rather than factors, and that is shown in the working.