About the Cups to ML Converter
This cups to ml converter turns a recipe measurement in cups into milliliters, or milliliters back into cups. Choose which cup your recipe means — US customary, US nutrition-label, metric, imperial or Japanese — and you get the exact volume plus US fluid ounces and tablespoons for good measure.
It helps when you are following an American recipe with a metric measuring jug, cooking from an Australian, UK or Japanese cookbook, scaling drinks and sauces, or reading a nutrition label that lists serving sizes in cups.
Cups measure volume, not weight: a cup of flour and a cup of water fill the same space but weigh very different amounts. To turn cups of an ingredient into grams, use a cups-to-grams converter that accounts for density.
How to use the cups to ml converter
- 1Enter the amount.
- 2Choose cups → ml or ml → cups.
- 3Pick the cup your recipe uses (US recipes usually mean the US customary cup).
- 4Read the converted volume and the US fl oz and tablespoon equivalents.
Formula and method
A US customary cup is exactly 8 US fluid ounces, and one US fluid ounce is exactly 29.5735295625 ml, so 1 US cup = 236.5882365 ml. US nutrition labels use a rounded "legal cup" of 240 ml. Australia, New Zealand and Canada use a 250 ml metric cup, the traditional UK imperial cup is half an imperial pint (284.13 ml), and Japan uses a 200 ml cup.
The converter multiplies cups by the chosen cup size to get milliliters, or divides milliliters by it to get cups. US fluid ounces and tablespoons (14.79 ml) are shown so you can measure small amounts without a cup.
- ml
- Volume in milliliters
- cups
- Volume in the chosen cup
Worked examples
1 US cup of milk
One US cup is 8 fl oz × 29.5735 ml = 236.59 ml, the same as 16 US tablespoons.
500 ml of stock in US cups
500 ÷ 236.588 = 2.11 US cups — just over 2 cups, or 16.9 fl oz.
3/4 metric cup in an Australian recipe
An Australian cup is 250 ml, so 0.75 × 250 = 187.5 ml.
Frequently asked questions
How many ml are in a cup?+
A US customary cup holds 236.59 ml, often rounded to 237 or 240 ml. A metric cup used in Australia, New Zealand and Canada is 250 ml, and a UK imperial cup is 284 ml.
Is 1 cup 250 ml?+
Only for metric cups. In US recipes 1 cup is 236.6 ml, about 5% less. The difference rarely matters for soups but can for baking, so check where the recipe comes from.
How many cups is 500 ml?+
500 ml is 2.11 US cups or exactly 2 metric cups. In imperial cups it is 1.76 cups.
What is a "legal cup" on nutrition labels?+
US nutrition labeling rules round the cup to 240 ml for serving sizes, so a label that says "1 cup (240 mL)" is using this legal cup rather than the 236.6 ml customary cup.
Can I convert cups of flour to ml with this?+
Yes for volume — a cup of flour is still 236.6 ml of space. But if your recipe needs grams, use a cups-to-grams converter, because a cup of flour weighs about 120–130 g while a cup of water weighs about 237 g.