Gallons to Quarts Converter
Convert US gallons to quarts — for splitting a bulk container into batches.
Updated
US quarts
4.00qt
1 gal = 4.00 qt
In short
How many quarts are in a gallon?
A US gallon is exactly 4 quarts, which is also 8 pints, 16 cups and 128 fluid ounces. In metric terms it is 3,785.41 millilitres. The imperial gallon also divides into four quarts, but it is 20.09 percent larger overall, so its quart is 1,136.52 millilitres rather than 946.35.
A US gallon of water weighs about 8.34 pounds, which is usually the real limit on how much you can carry.
US gallons to US quarts — quick reference
| US gallons (gal) | US quarts (qt) |
|---|---|
| 0.3 gal | 1.00 qt |
| 0.5 gal | 2.00 qt |
| 1 gal | 4.00 qt |
| 2 gal | 8.00 qt |
| 3 gal | 12.00 qt |
| 5 gal | 20.00 qt |
| 10 gal | 40.00 qt |
| 20 gal | 80.00 qt |
The formula, worked line by line
The conversion multiplies by four, and the four is a definition shared by both gallon systems. The US liquid gallon is exactly 231 cubic inches, which became exactly 3.785411784 litres once the inch was fixed at 2.54 centimetres in 1959.
“The US gallon is exactly 231 cubic inches, and the inch is exactly 2.54 centimetres.”
The imperial gallon reached its own exact figure by a different route, originally the volume of ten pounds of water and now fixed at exactly 4.54609 litres. Two independent definitions, which is why the ratio between them is an untidy 1.2009.
quarts = US gallons x 4
1 US gallon = 231 cubic inches = 3.785411784 L
1 gal -> 1 x 4 = 4 quarts
1 gallon = 4 quarts = 8 pints = 16 cups = 128 fl oz
imperial gallon = 4.54609 L, 20.09 percent larger- Gallons entered
- 1
- Quarts per gallon
- 4, by definition
- Multiplication
- 1 x 4 = 4
- US quarts
- 4 quarts
The same volume is eight pints, sixteen cups and 3,785.41 millilitres, and it weighs about 8.34 pounds if it is water. The volume figure never changes and the weight does, which is why a plan built only on volume tends to meet a surprise at the lifting stage.
Everything divides by two
The US liquid system splits by powers of two from the gallon down: 4 quarts, 8 pints, 16 cups, 128 fluid ounces. Halving a gallon gives a half gallon, halving again gives a quart, and again gives a pint. No step ever requires dividing by an awkward number.
- 1 gallon
- 128 fl oz
- Half gallon
- 64 fl oz, 2 quarts
- Quarter gallon
- 32 fl oz, 1 quart
- Eighth gallon
- 16 fl oz, 1 pint
- Sixteenth gallon
- 8 fl oz, 1 cup
This is the practical advantage the customary system still holds in a kitchen: every useful fraction of a gallon has its own name and its own container.
The dry gallon exists too
Alongside the liquid gallon the United States keeps a dry gallon of 268.8025 cubic inches, part of the bushel system used for produce. It does not appear in recipes or on liquid containers, but it is why dry pints and dry quarts are larger than their liquid namesakes.
How to use the gallons to quarts converter
A gallon is four quarts, a ratio that holds in both the US and imperial systems because the quart was defined as a quarter of the gallon. The multiplication carries no rounding error at all. What differs between the systems is the size of the gallon, not how many quarts it splits into.
The reason to convert is portioning. A gallon jug is a purchase; a quart is a usable amount. Splitting bulk stock, brine or water into quart containers turns something unwieldy into something that fits in a freezer and thaws in a reasonable time, and the arithmetic for that is a multiplication by four.
4 quarts
One US gallon
3,785.41 mL
20 quarts
A five gallon bucket
the hardware store size
8.34 lb
What a gallon of water weighs
before the container
The third figure is the one that decides what is actually practical. Volume is easy to plan with and weight is what you have to carry. A five gallon bucket of water is over forty pounds, which is why bulk water is sold in gallon jugs rather than in the buckets that would hold it more efficiently.
The rest of the ladder is worth having in view when splitting. A gallon is four quarts, eight pints or sixteen cups, so a half gallon is two quarts and a quarter gallon is one. Every division is by a power of two, which is why bulk liquid portions so cleanly without a calculator.
- 1 gallon
- 4 quarts
- The same, in pints
- 8 pints
- The same, in cups
- 16 cups
- The same, in fluid ounces
- 128 fl oz
- The same, in millilitres
- 3,785.41 mL
- An imperial gallon
- 4 imperial quarts, 4,546.09 mL
Five names for one quantity. Which one gets used says more about the size of the job than about how precisely anything was measured.
When the portions get down to cups
A quart is four cups and a gallon sixteen. That page covers the quart, the litre it nearly matches, and the separate dry quart used for produce.
Open the quarts to cups converter →US gallons converted to quarts, with the millilitre figure and the approximate weight if the liquid is water. The weight column is what usually decides how a job gets done.
| US gallons | US quarts | Water weight, approx |
|---|---|---|
| 0.25 gal | 1 qt | 2.1 lb |
| 0.5 gal | 2 qt | 4.2 lb |
| 0.75 gal | 3 qt | 6.3 lb |
| 1 gal | 4 qt | 8.3 lb |
| 1.5 gal | 6 qt | 12.5 lb |
| 2 gal | 8 qt | 16.7 lb |
| 3 gal | 12 qt | 25.0 lb |
| 5 gal | 20 qt | 41.7 lb |
| 10 gal | 40 qt | 83.5 lb |
| 15 gal | 60 qt | 125.2 lb |
| 20 gal | 80 qt | 166.9 lb |
| 25 gal | 100 qt | 208.6 lb |
| 50 gal | 200 qt | 417.3 lb |
What a gallon actually weighs
Volume plans a job and weight performs it. A US gallon of water weighs about 8.34 pounds, which comes from 3,785.41 millilitres at roughly one gram per millilitre. That is manageable in one hand. Five gallons is over forty pounds, which is a two-handed lift and a genuine strain on a bucket handle.
This is why bulk liquid is packaged the way it is. Gallon jugs exist because a gallon is about the heaviest single container most people will carry comfortably, and five gallon buckets exist for things that get moved once and then decanted rather than carried repeatedly.
- By volume
- 5 gallons, 20 quarts, 80 cups
- In metric
- about 18.93 litres
- By weight, if it is water
- about 41.7 pounds
- Plus the bucket
- roughly 43 to 45 pounds loaded
- Practical limit
- fill it where it will stand
The volume figure says the bucket holds twenty quarts. The weight figure says you should fill it in the place it is going to stay. Brining, fermenting and bulk-water plans that ignore the second number tend to get rearranged partway through.
Denser liquids make it worse in proportion. Anything with a lot of dissolved salt or sugar weighs more per gallon than water, so a gallon of brine or syrup is heavier than the 8.34 pounds a plain water calculation suggests. The volume stays the same and the lift does not.
Two gallons, and knowing which one
A US liquid gallon is exactly 231 cubic inches, which is 3.785411784 litres. An imperial gallon is exactly 4.54609 litres. The imperial gallon is 20.09 percent larger, and both divide into four quarts, so the gap propagates identically down every rung of the two ladders.
The split dates to 1824. England had used several gallons at once, and the United States had inherited the wine gallon of 231 cubic inches. Britain abolished all of them and defined a single imperial gallon in their place, while the US kept what it had. Neither has had a reason to move since.
- US gallon
- 3,785.41 mL, four quarts of 946.35 mL
- Imperial gallon
- 4,546.09 mL, four quarts of 1,136.52 mL
- Imperial quart against US quart
- 20.09 percent larger
- US gallon against 4 litres
- 5.67 percent smaller
The imperial quart is a little over a litre; the US quart is a little under one. That is the quickest way to tell which system a figure came from.
For anything measured as a concentration, the distinction is not cosmetic. A brine or a cleaning solution mixed to a recipe written for an imperial gallon and made up in a US gallon comes out 20.09 percent stronger than intended, because the solute stayed the same while the solvent shrank.
Every US gallons value, worked out
46 common US gallons figures each get their own page, with the answer at full precision, the arithmetic, what rounding costs, and the nearest real-world reference point on the scale.
Questions people ask
Sources
Where the constants and formulas on this page come from. Each line names the figure it backs.
The US liquid gallon is exactly 231 cubic inches, which is 3.785411784 litres, and divides into four quarts of 946.352946 mL.
NIST Guide to the SI, Appendix B.8 — Factors for units listed alphabetically — NIST
The imperial gallon is exactly 4.54609 litres, making it 20.09 percent larger than the US liquid gallon.
Weights and Measures Act 1985, Schedule 1 — UK Government legislation
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