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Grams of Flour to Cups

How many cups a weight of all-purpose flour makes, and how far that answer moves if the cup was dipped into the bag rather than spooned into it: a quarter more.

Flour is the ingredient where the answer depends on how the cup was filled: 120 g spooned, 148.8 g dipped, 159.6 g packed. That is a third between the extremes, and it is why a recipe in cups and a scale disagree.

With amount 1, grams to cups converter comes to 120 — converted. It is reached in 9 steps, the last of which is 120 / 1, and each one is printed on the page with its numbers filled in. The formula is the one published by King Arthur Baking, not an approximation fitted to it.

Formula and sources checked · How we check

Converted
120
Chart weight of one cup
120 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 0120 g
Grams in a cup as filled
120 * 1120 g
Range across filling techniques
120 * 0.33 * 139.6 g
In grams
1 * 120 + 0120 g
In cups
120 / 1201 cups
Converted
120 / 1120
In ounces
120 / 28.3495234.233 oz
In tablespoons
1 * 1616 tbsp
Volume it occupies
1 * 236.58824236.588 ml

Weights are typical, from the King Arthur chart. Humidity, brand and how long the bag has stood all move them by a few per cent.

Which figure should a recipe use?

Spooned, at 120 g a cup, is what most published American recipes assume, because it is what test kitchens standardise on. If a bake has been coming out dry, the likeliest cause is dipping the cup into the bag, which is a quarter more flour than the recipe intended.

Does the type of flour change it?

Somewhat. Bread flour is close to all-purpose; cake flour is lighter at about 114 g a cup and whole wheat heavier at around 128. Those are roughly 5% either side, which decides a lean bread dough and vanishes without trace in a cookie.

The formula

  1. Chart weight of one cupw1 + w2 + w3 + w4 + w5 + w6 + w7 + w8
  2. Grams in a cup as filledchart_g_per_cup * pack_factor
  3. Range across filling techniqueschart_g_per_cup * 0.33 * packs
  4. In gramsin_cups * g_per_cup + in_grams_direct
  5. In cupsgrams / g_per_cup
  6. Convertedto_volume_share == 0 ? grams / to_mass_share : cups / to_volume_share
  7. In ouncesgrams / 28.349523125
  8. In tablespoonscups * 16
  9. Volume it occupiescups * 236.5882365

Formula from King Arthur Baking — ingredient weight chart, NIST Handbook 44 — US customary volume measures, USDA FoodData Central — measured food densities.

The same calculator, other cases

Grams of Sugar to Cups

Undecided? The Grams to Cups Converter carries every case behind one control.

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