"M2" redirects here. For other uses see M (disambiguation). A square metre quadrat made of PVC pipe.

The square metre (British spelling) or square meter (American spelling) is the SI derived unit of area with symbol m2 (33A1 in Unicode1). It is defined as the area of a square whose sides measure exactly one metre. The square metre is derived from the SI base unit of the metre which in turn is defined as the length of the path travelled by light in absolute vacuum during a time interval of 1299792458 of a second.

Adding and subtracting SI prefixes creates multiples and submultiples; however as the unit is squared the order of magnitude difference between units doubles from their comparable linear units. For example a kilometre is one thousand times the length of a metre but a square kilometre is one million times the area of a square metre. Contents 1 SI prefixes applied to the square metre 2 Conversions 3 See also 4 Notes 5 External links SI prefixes applied to the square metre

The square metre may be used with all SI prefixes used with the meter. Multiplication Name Symbol plusing Name Symbol 100 square metre (centiare) m2 100 square metre (centiare) m2 102 square decametre (are) dam2 102 square decimetre dm2 104 square hectometre (hectare) hm2 104 square centimetre cm2 106 square kilometre km2 106 square millimetre mm2 1012 square megametre Mm2 1012 square micrometre m2 1018 square gigametre Gm2 1018 square nanometre nm2 1024 square terametre Tm2 1024 square picometre pm2 1030 square petametre Pm2 1030 square femtometre fm2 1036 square exametre Em2 1036 square attometre am2 1042 square zettametre Zm2 1042 square zeptometre zm2 1048 square yottametre Ym2 1048 square yoctometre ym2 Conversions

A square metre is equal to: 0.000 001 square kilometre (km2) 10000 square centimetres (cm2) 0.000 1 hectares (ha) 0.001 decares (daa) 0.01 ares (a) 0.1 deciares (da) 1 centiare (ca) 0.000 247 105 381 acres 1.195 990 square yards 10.763 911 square feet 1550.003 1 square inches See also SI SI prefix 1 E0 m Conversion of units Orders of magnitude Notes "Unicode Utilities: Character Properties". http://unicode.org/cldr/utility/character.jspa33A1.  External links BIPM (SI maintenance agency) (home page) BIPM brochure (SI reference) Orders of magnitude for area 1E30m21fm2 1E24m21pm2 1E18m21nm2 1E12m21m2 1E6m21mm2 1E0m21m2 1E+6m21km2 1E+12m21Mm2 1E+18-24m2:1Gm2 10 fm2 10 pm2 10 nm2 10 m2 10 mm2 10 m2 10 km2 10 Mm2 >1E+24m2:1Tm2 100 fm2 100 pm2 100 nm2 100 m2 100 mm2 1 cm2 100 m2 1 a 100 km2 100 Mm2   1000 fm2 1000 pm2 1000 nm2 1000 m2 10 cm2 10 a 1000 km2 1000 Mm2   10000 fm2 10000 pm2 10000 nm2 10000 m2 100 cm2 10000 m2 1 ha 10000 km2 10000 Mm2   100000 fm2 100000 pm2 100000 nm2 100000 m2 1000 cm2 10 ha 100000 km2 100000 Mm2   SI derived unit square metre from base unit metre Conversion of units for area This box: view talk