Butter Calculator
Result
Butter
- Sticks
- 1.00
- Cups
- 0.500
- Tablespoons
- 8.0
- Teaspoons
- 24.0
- Ounces
- 4.00
- Pounds
- 0.250
- Butterfat
- 92.0 g
- Water
- 18.3 g
This butter calculator turns any butter measurement into all the others — sticks, cups, tablespoons, teaspoons, ounces, pounds, grams and kilograms — and then splits the result into butterfat and water. That is what separates it from a plain unit converter. US butter is about 81% fat and 16% water, so a stick weighing 113.4 grams carries roughly 92 grams of fat and 18 grams of water. Type an amount, choose the unit you have, and read every other form at once.
Butter by the stick, in every other measure
| Sticks | Cups | Grams | Tablespoons | Butterfat (g) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0.25 | 0.125 | 28.3 | 2 | 23 |
| 0.5 | 0.25 | 56.7 | 4 | 46 |
| 1 | 0.5 | 113.4 | 8 | 92 |
| 1.5 | 0.75 | 170.1 | 12 | 138 |
| 2 | 1 | 226.8 | 16 | 184 |
| 3 | 1.5 | 340.2 | 24 | 275.9 |
| 4 | 2 | 453.6 | 32 | 367.9 |
One stick is 4 ounces by definition, so the cups and tablespoons columns are exact rather than measured. The fat column is 81.11% of the gram column, rounded to one decimal.
Formula
Grams = amount × grams per unit · Butterfat = Grams × 0.8111 · Water = Grams × 0.1617
- amount
- The number you type in
- unit
- The measure you start from: stick, cup, tablespoon, teaspoon, ounce, pound, gram or kilogram
- g
- Grams in one unit — 113.4 for a stick, 226.8 for a cup, 14.2 for a tablespoon
- 0.8111
- Butterfat as a fraction of butter by weight
- 0.1617
- Water as a fraction of butter by weight
Reach for it when the recipe and your kitchen disagree about units: a US recipe asking for 1½ sticks when all you own is a scale, or a metric recipe asking for 250 g when your butter is printed in tablespoons. It also answers the fat question — how much of that butter is actually fat — which is the number the oil-to-butter swap is built on.
Worked examples
One stick of butter from a US recipe
- A US stick is defined as 4 ounces, so the starting point is 4 oz
- 4 oz in grams: 4 × 28.349523125 = 113.4 g — the 113 g on the wrapper is this, rounded
- Down the chain of definitions: half a cup, 8 tablespoons, 24 teaspoons, a quarter of a pound
- Butterfat: 113.398 × 0.8111 = 92.0 g. Water: 113.398 × 0.1617 = 18.3 g
92.0 + 18.3 is 110.3, not 113.4. The missing three grams are milk solids and salt — which is why the water figure here is not simply "the rest".
250 g of butter from a metric recipe
- Grams is the base, so the weight is 250 g — no conversion needed
- Sticks: 250 ÷ 113.398 = 2.20
- Cups: 250 ÷ 226.796 = 1.102
- Tablespoons: 250 ÷ 14.175 = 17.6; teaspoons: 250 ÷ 4.725 = 52.9
- Butterfat: 250 × 0.8111 = 202.8 g, so about a fifth of this block is not fat
2.2 sticks is an awkward thing to cut. Two sticks plus a level tablespoon is 241 g — close enough for cakes and cookies, and much easier to measure.
Limitations
The 81.11% fat and 16.17% water figures are USDA averages for salted butter. Real butter moves with the brand, the season and the feed: the legal floor is 80% milkfat, most American butter sits between 80% and 82%, and European-style butters run higher. Spreadable blends sold in the same shape run lower still. Nothing here compensates for that. The stick, cup and tablespoon figures are definitions rather than measurements, so they are exact by construction — and the gram figure they produce is 0.4% above the number printed on the wrapper.
Frequently asked questions
- How much is a stick of butter in grams?
- 113.4 grams, because a US stick is defined as 4 ounces and 4 oz is 113.398 g. That is also half a cup, 8 tablespoons, 24 teaspoons and a quarter of a pound. The wrapper says 113 g because the number is rounded for printing; the 0.4% gap is far inside the tolerance of a kitchen scale.
- How do I convert sticks to cups?
- Two sticks to a cup. One stick is half a cup, so 1½ sticks is three quarters of a cup and a whole 1-pound block — four sticks — is two cups. The rule follows from the definitions rather than from any measurement: a stick is 4 ounces and a cup of butter is 8 ounces.
- What is the butterfat content of butter?
- About 81% fat and 16% water by weight in the United States, with the remaining 3% made up of milk solids and salt. Federal law sets the floor at 80% milkfat (7 CFR 58.305), so ordinary American butter lands between 80% and 82%, European-style butter goes higher, and spreadable blends go lower. Every gram of that fat is about 9 kcal.
- Does salted butter weigh the same as unsalted?
- Yes for practical purposes: salt is roughly 1.5% to 2% of the weight, so a stick of salted butter is about 2 grams heavier than an unsalted one. That matters for a large batch and not at all for a single stick. The fat figures on this page are the salted-butter averages, which is why they sum with water to slightly less than the total.
- Why does this page give fat and water separately instead of just grams?
- Because that split is what decides whether butter can be swapped for oil. A stick of butter is 113.4 grams on the scale but only about 92 grams of fat, so replacing oil with butter takes about 23% more butter by weight to deliver the same fat — the calculation the oil-to-butter page runs in the other direction.
References
- Butter — definition and standard of identity (21 U.S.C. § 321a) — Cornell Law School, Legal Information Institute
- 7 CFR § 58.305 — Meaning of words (butter: not less than 80 percent milkfat) — US Government Publishing Office, Electronic Code of Federal Regulations
- FoodData Central — Butter, salted (FDC ID 173410) — US Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service