Home › Cup sizes by country
How big is a cup? US, UK, metric and Japanese cups
| Cup | mL | Used in |
|---|---|---|
| US customary cup | 236.59 | United States recipes |
| US "legal" cup (nutrition labels) | 240 | US food labels |
| Metric cup | 250 | Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa |
| Imperial cup | 284.13 | Older UK recipes |
| Japanese cup | 200 | Japan (a rice-cooker cup is 180 mL) |
Does the difference matter?
A metric cup is 5.7% bigger than a US cup. In a recipe that uses 3 cups of flour, that's roughly 20 g extra. Most cakes can take that, but a delicate sponge or a precise bread hydration can't. If you know where the recipe comes from, convert using the right cup. Better still, use the gram weights: our ingredient pages show weights for US, metric and imperial cups.
See also: cups to mL · tablespoons to teaspoons