I always wondered
Why are there 5,280 feet in a mile?
The Simple Answer
A mile is defined as 5,280 feet because it is 8 furlongs, and a furlong is 660 feet. The number is a definition more than a discovery.
It is one of the strangest numbers in everyday measurement. Here is what is solid, and what we could not find an answer to.
What the official sources say
The National Institute of Standards and Technology defines the international mile as 5,280 feet. NOAA's glossary calls the same length the statute mile, also known as the land mile or the English mile. In 1959 the United States and other countries fixed the foot at exactly 0.3048 meter and the yard at exactly 0.9144 meter, so the mile has an exact metric length too.
The sums
8 furlongs × 660 feet = 5,280 feet
5,280 feet ÷ 3 = 1,760 yards
5,280 feet × 0.3048 meter = 1,609.344 meters, exactly
| Distance | In miles | In kilometers |
|---|---|---|
| 1 mile | 1 | 1.609 |
| 5K race | 3.107 | 5 |
| 10K race | 6.214 | 10 |
| 1 kilometer | 0.621 | 1 |
The story people tell
The 5,280-foot mile is usually traced to England in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, when a statute mile of eight furlongs replaced an older mile of about 5,000 feet. That fits the numbers, because 8 furlongs of 660 feet is 5,280.
What we could not find
None of the sources we read says why that number was chosen, or why a furlong is 660 feet. There are popular explanations, but they usually come without a source, so we are leaving them out. The honest answer is that 5,280 is what the definition came out as, and everyone kept it.
Metric & Imperial Converter: Convert miles to kilometers, feet to meters and more.