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Miles to Kilometers Converter

Convert miles to kilometers instantly, with a reference table covering race distances, speed limits and journey lengths.

Miles to KM Converter

1 mi = 1.6093 km

Multiply miles by 1.609344 to get kilometers.

The link carries the values you entered, so whoever opens it sees the same result. Nothing is stored on our side — the numbers travel in the link itself.

Miles to kilometers reference table

The conversions people look up most often, rounded to 4 decimal places.

Common miles to kilometers conversions
Mile (mi)Kilometer (km)
1 mi1.6093 km
2 mi3.2187 km
3 mi4.828 km
5 mi8.0467 km
6.2 mi9.9779 km
10 mi16.0934 km
13.1 mi21.0824 km
20 mi32.1869 km
26.2 mi42.1648 km
30 mi48.2803 km
50 mi80.4672 km
60 mi96.5606 km
100 mi160.9344 km

The miles people look up most

1 mi = 1.6093 km
A mile is exactly 1.609344 km, because a mile is 5,280 feet and a foot is 0.3048 m.
13.1 mi = 21.0824 km
A half marathon, as commonly written. The true distance is 13.109 miles.
26.2 mi = 42.1648 km
What people call a marathon. The real distance is 26.219 miles, and that extra 0.019 is about nine seconds at an eight-minute pace.
100 mi = 160.9344 km
The point where "add 60%" stops being an approximation worth arguing about.

How the miles to km calculation works

One mile is exactly 1.609344 kilometers:

kilometers = miles × 1.609344

The factor looks arbitrary because it is: a mile is 5,280 feet, and a foot is 0.3048 m, so the mile inherits a number nobody chose deliberately.

Running distances are the most common reason to convert:

Race Miles Kilometers
5K 3.107 5
10K 6.214 10
Half marathon 13.109 21.1
Marathon 26.219 42.195

Note the direction of the rounding. A 5K is defined as exactly 5 km, and 3.107 miles is the conversion of it — not the other way round. The marathon's 42.195 km comes from the 1908 London Olympic course, which is why it resists a tidy number in either system.

Two more contexts:

  • Speed limits. A 70 mph motorway limit is 112.65 km/h, which most European countries round to 110 or 120. A 30 mph urban limit is 48.28 km/h, near the 50 km/h standard.
  • Fuel and range. An electric car rated 300 miles has 482.8 km of range on the same test cycle — though EPA and WLTP cycles are not comparable, so a converted figure is not a like-for-like one.

The mental shortcut is add 60%: 10 miles → 16 km, against a true 16.09. For quick work it is accurate to well under a percent.

Frequently asked questions

Is Britain going to switch road signs to kilometres?

Nothing is currently planned. Road signs, speed limits and distance markers in Britain are all in miles and the traffic signs regulations require them to be, because the metrication that covered most of trade in the 1970s and 1980s deliberately left the road network out. The exception is the small blue driver location signs on motorways, which give the distance in kilometres from the start of the route.

Is a nautical mile the same as the mile this converter uses?

No. A nautical mile is 1.852 km, about 15% longer than the statute mile used here, and it is defined as one minute of latitude - which is why charts and aviation keep it. If a distance came from a flight tracker or a marine forecast, check which mile it means first: on a 500-mile leg the two answers differ by more than 120 km.

Where does the awkward 5,280 feet in a mile come from?

From a Roman unit that was later bent to fit English farming. The mille passus, a thousand double paces, was about 1,480 metres. England fixed its own mile by statute in 1593 at eight furlongs of 660 feet, so that it was a whole number of furlongs rather than a round number of feet. Scotland and Ireland kept longer miles of their own into the nineteenth century.

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Further reading