Kilograms to Pounds Converter

The working, step by step

Every line below updates with whatever you type above. The point is not the answer — it is the method, which is the same for any pair of units.

Copy the working

The same weight, two different numbers

The bar is one physical quantity. The scale above it is marked in kilograms and the scale below it in pounds, and the tick marks do not line up, because a pound is a smaller unit — so it takes more of them to describe the same thing. That is all a conversion factor is.

How heavy is that?

A number is easier to judge next to something familiar.

Your turn

Reading a method and being able to use it are different things. Answer within half a per cent and it counts as correct.

Kilograms and pounds, and why the number is 2.2046

Almost every country measures mass in kilograms. Three do not, and one of them is the United States, so the conversion between kilograms and pounds is probably the single most looked-up sum on the internet.

The relationship between the two is not an approximation anyone has to measure. It is a definition. Since the International Yard and Pound Agreement of 1959, one pound is exactly 0.45359237 kilograms — a number agreed between the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa to stop each country's pound drifting slightly apart from the others. Every kilogram-to-pound conversion you will ever do is arithmetic on that one exact figure.

Turn it around and you get the number in the box above:

1 ÷ 0.45359237 = 2.2046226218… pounds in a kilogram

That is why 2.2 shows up everywhere. It is not a rounded-off measurement; it is the reciprocal of an exact definition, and it never changes.

One thing worth knowing: strictly speaking these are units of mass, not weight. Your mass is the same on the Moon; your weight is not. In everyday use nobody minds, and bathroom scales, baggage counters and recipes all use the two words interchangeably. It only matters in physics coursework, where a kilogram is mass and the newton is the unit of weight.

How to use this converter

1. Type into either box. Kilograms on the left, pounds on the right. The other side updates as you type — there is no button to press and nothing to submit.
2. Swap the direction with the button between the two boxes if you would rather work from pounds back to kilograms. Whatever answer you had carries across.
3. Set the decimals if the default is too precise or not precise enough. Auto keeps four decimal places for ordinary numbers and tightens up for very large ones.
4. Copy the answer with the copy button, which takes the result and its unit together, ready to paste.
5. Use the shortcut buttons for the values that come up constantly — 20 kg and 23 kg are the two most common airline baggage limits.
6. Type mixed units if that is how you have them. 11 st 4 lb or 5 lb 8 oz both work — tab out of the box and it tells you how it read them.
7. Share or bookmark the result. The address bar updates as you type, so /tools/kg-to-lbs/?kg=23 opens with 23 already filled in.

Under the boxes you will also see the sum written out, and a stones-and-pounds reading, which is how body weight is still usually quoted in the UK and Ireland.

Common uses and tips

Where people actually need this

• Airline baggage. Most economy checked-bag limits are 23 kg (50.7 lb) and most carry-on limits are 7–10 kg. US carriers usually print 50 lb, which is 22.68 kg — slightly less than 23 kg, so a bag packed to a European limit can be overweight on an American airline.
• Body weight. Gyms, doctors and fitness apps switch between the two constantly. In the UK the answer usually wants converting again into stones, which the tool shows underneath.
• Weight plates. Metric plates are 20 kg, 15 kg, 10 kg, 5 kg and 2.5 kg. Imperial plates are 45 lb, 35 lb, 25 lb, 10 lb and 5 lb. A 20 kg plate is 44.09 lb, so a "20 kg" and a "45 lb" bar are not the same load — about 0.9 lb apart per plate.
• Recipes and shopping. A US recipe calling for 2 lb of flour wants 907 g, near enough a 1 kg bag less a tenth.
• Shipping and freight. Couriers price in whole kilograms or whole pounds and round up, so a parcel at 2.1 kg is usually billed as 3 kg.

A mental trick that works

To go from kilograms to pounds without a calculator: double it, then add ten percent of the answer. For 80 kg: double is 160, ten percent of that is 16, total 176 lb. The exact answer is 176.37 lb, so you are within a quarter of a percent — close enough for a gym bar or a suitcase.

Going the other way is less tidy. Halving and taking off ten percent gives you a factor of 0.45 against the true 0.4536, which runs about 0.8 % light. On a 50 lb bag that is a 200 g error, which is fine for a rough guess and not fine at a check-in desk.

Tips worth knowing

• Round the right way near a limit. Converting 23 kg gives 50.706 lb. If an airline's limit is 50 lb, rounding down to "about 50" hides the fact that you are over it. Near any threshold, keep the decimals.
• lb, lbs and # are the same unit. The abbreviation comes from the Roman libra, which is also why the pound sign is £ and why # is called the pound sign in the US.
• Watch out for other pounds. Precious metals are weighed in troy pounds (373.24 g, about 18 % lighter). Unless you are weighing gold or silver, the pound you want is the avoirdupois pound this tool uses.
• Metric tons are not imperial tons. A tonne is 1,000 kg (2,204.6 lb). A US short ton is 2,000 lb (907.18 kg). They differ by about ten percent, which is an expensive mistake on a freight invoice.

Values people look up most

Each of these opens the converter with the number already in it.

• 1 kg to lbs
• 2 kg to lbs
• 5 kg to lbs
• 7 kg to lbs
• 10 kg to lbs
• 15 kg to lbs
• 20 kg to lbs
• 23 kg to lbs
• 25 kg to lbs
• 50 kg to lbs
• 55 kg to lbs
• 60 kg to lbs
• 65 kg to lbs
• 70 kg to lbs
• 75 kg to lbs
• 80 kg to lbs
• 85 kg to lbs
• 90 kg to lbs
• 100 kg to lbs

Quick reference

Kilograms	Pounds	Often this is…
1 kg	2.2046 lb	a bag of sugar
2.5 kg	5.5116 lb	smallest gym plate
5 kg	11.023 lb	cabin bag, budget airline
7 kg	15.432 lb	common carry-on limit
10 kg	22.046 lb	a full watering can
20 kg	44.092 lb	Olympic weight plate
23 kg	50.706 lb	standard checked-bag limit
50 kg	110.23 lb
70 kg	154.32 lb	11 st 0.3 lb
80 kg	176.37 lb	12 st 8.4 lb
100 kg	220.46 lb	15 st 10.5 lb
1,000 kg	2,204.6 lb	one tonne

Questions people ask

Is 1 kg exactly 2.2 lb?

No. It is 2.2046226218 lb. Using 2.2 is about two parts in a thousand low, which is invisible on a bag of apples and worth 0.1 kg on a 50 kg load.

How many kg is 1 lb?

Exactly 0.45359237 kg, by international definition rather than by measurement.

Why does my scale show stones?

A stone is 14 pounds, or 6.35 kg. It is still the normal way to talk about body weight in the UK and Ireland, and almost nowhere else. The converter shows the stones-and-pounds reading underneath the main answer.

Is a kilogram a measure of weight or mass?

Mass. So is the pound, as used here. Weight is a force and is properly measured in newtons, but outside a physics classroom nobody makes the distinction.

What about kg to lbs and oz?

Take the whole number of pounds, then multiply what is left by 16 to get ounces. 2.5 kg is 5.5116 lb, which is 5 lb and 0.5116 × 16 = 8.19 oz.