Butter Converter (Sticks, Cups, Tablespoons, Grams)

Convert butter between US sticks, cups, tablespoons, grams, ounces and the European 250 g block, in any direction, with the wrapper markings explained and an honest account of what melting does to a measured tablespoon.

Last updated 24 Sep 2026

Butter: sticks, cups, grams

Sticks, cups and spoons ⇄ grams

How much butter?

In whatSticks, cups and tablespoons of butter are all DEFINED quantities of mass, not measured volumes. See the note below.

What state is it in?Changes nothing about the weight. It changes whether you can use the wrapper marks at all.

A US stick of butter and a European block, drawn to scale against each other: 1.2 px per gram, so the two bars really are in the ratio of their masses. The seven lines across the stick are the cuts its wrapper is printed for — eight tablespoons, a quarter pound, half a cup. The two faint lines inside the block show where one and two sticks would end, which is why a 250 g block is about 2.2 sticks and not a round number of anything. This is a drawing of packaging, not of a circuit.

113.4gExample

1 US stick of butter

One definition, and everything else follows

1 stick = ¼ lb = 113.3981 g = 4 oz = 8 tbsp = ½ cup · 1 cup = ½ lb = 226.7962 g

1 lb: 453.59237 g exactly — the international avoirdupois pound
1 stick: a quarter pound, 113.3981 g. Printed as 113 g
1 tbsp butter: one eighth of a stick, 14.1748 g. A division of a mass, not a spoonful
1 block: 250 g in most of Europe. 2.2046 sticks

Worked example

1 US stick of butter
A stick is a quarter of an avoirdupois pound: 453.59237 g / 4
= 113.3981 g, which every wrapper prints as 113 g
Which is also 4 oz, 8 tablespoons of 14.17 g each, and half a cup
A 250 g European block is 2.205 of these, so a recipe wanting 2 sticks needs 227 g cut off the block
USDA's own portions for Butter, salted agree: 227 g per cup, 113 g per stick, 14 g per tablespoon

One US stick, every way it is written

The important row is the third. Butter tablespoons are not a volume measurement at all: the wrapper divides a quarter pound into eight, so a “tablespoon of butter” is 14.17 g by definition, and it happens to be printed in a unit of volume. That is why butter conversions are a packaging question and not a density question. USDA’s own portions for Butter, salted (FDC 173410) are 227 g per cup, 113 g per stick and 14 g per tablespoon, which is those definitions rounded to the gram.
Written as	Exact	As the wrapper prints it	Why
1 stick	113.3981 g	113 g	A quarter of a pound of 453.59237 g, exactly
1/2 cup	113.3981 g	113 g	Two sticks make a cup, so a cup of butter is half a pound
8 tablespoons	14.1748 g each	14 g each	The stick is divided into eight equal pieces by the marks on the wrapper
4 oz	113.3981 g	4 oz	An ounce is 28.349523125 g exactly
1 cup butter	226.7962 g	227 g	Two sticks. USDA’s own portion list for Butter, salted gives 227 g
1 European block	250 g	250 g	Sold by mass, not cut into sticks. 2.2046 sticks

Cold, soft or melted

Melting does not destroy butter, so the mass is the same before and after. The volume is not: fat expands as it melts, and the water and milk solids separate. USDA publishes no cup measure for melted whole butter, so this page gives no figure for one. The nearest published bound is anhydrous butter oil (FDC 173412) at 205 g per cup against 227 g for two sticks — about 10% lighter for the same measured volume. Melted whole butter sits between the two, and where exactly is not something this page will guess at. The rule that follows is simple: when a recipe says “4 tbsp butter, melted”, cut four marks off the stick and then melt them.
State	Does the weight change?	Can you use the wrapper marks?	What to watch
Cold and firm	No	Yes — cut on the printed line	The most accurate way to take butter by volume, because the marks measure mass
Softened	No	Roughly — the stick loses its shape	Softened butter pressed into a measuring cup traps air, so a packed cup is not half a pound any more. Weigh it
Melted	No	No	A measured tablespoon of liquid butter is less butter than a tablespoon cut off the stick. Melt the cut piece; do not measure the liquid

Sticks, blocks and the marks on the paper

A stick of butter is a quarter of a pound. Everything else on this page follows from that one fact. Two sticks make a cup, so a cup of butter is half a pound, which is 226.80 g. A stick is divided into eight by the marks printed on its wrapper, so a butter tablespoon is 14.17 g. USDA’s own portion list for butter gives 227 g per cup, 113 g per stick and 14 g per tablespoon, which is exactly those definitions rounded to the gram.

Butter tablespoons are a mass measurement in disguise. This is worth pausing on, because it is the reason butter behaves unlike every other ingredient in a recipe. When a US recipe says four tablespoons of butter, it does not mean four tablespoons of anything measured in a spoon. It means half a stick — four of the eight divisions the manufacturer printed on the paper. The unit is a unit of volume by name only, and the quantity it stands for is fixed in grams. That is why you can cut butter accurately with a knife and a wrapper and cannot measure it accurately in a cup.

European butter has no stick. Outside North America butter is a block, commonly 250 g, sold by mass and marked with nothing. A 250 g block is 2.205 sticks, which is not a number any recipe wants to hear. The practical answer is a set of scales: cut 113 g for a stick, 227 g for a cup, 14 g for a tablespoon, and stop trying to reason in sticks.

Softened and melted. Melting butter does not change its mass and does change its volume, so the two are not interchangeable once it is liquid. Fat expands on melting, and butter is about a sixth water, which separates. A tablespoon of liquid butter measured in a spoon is therefore less butter than a tablespoon cut off a cold stick. USDA publishes no cup weight for melted whole butter and this page will not invent one; the nearest published figure is anhydrous butter oil at 205 g per cup against 227 g for two sticks, about 10% lighter, and melted whole butter lies somewhere between. The way out is the same as the way out of everything else on this page: when a recipe says “melted”, measure the solid butter first and melt what you measured. Softened butter has the same problem in a milder form — pressed into a cup it traps air, so a packed cup of soft butter is no longer half a pound.

Salted and unsalted. The two are interchangeable by weight, and their USDA portion weights are identical, but the salt is not free. Salted butter carries roughly 1% to 2% salt by mass and manufacturers do not all declare how much, so swapping in salted butter adds an amount of salt the recipe did not ask for. In a cake that is usually harmless; in a shortbread or a buttercream it is not. The salt conversion calculator is the page for working out what the change amounts to, and for the much larger trap that one teaspoon of salt is not one teaspoon of salt. For the rest of a US recipe, the cups to grams converter handles the flour and sugar, and the oven temperature converter handles the oven.

Frequently asked questions

How many grams is a stick of butter?

113 g as printed, 113.40 g exactly. A stick is a quarter of a pound, which is a quarter of 453.59237 g. It is also 4 oz, 8 tablespoons and half a cup, all of which are the same quantity written differently.

How many tablespoons in a stick of butter?

Eight, and the wrapper is printed with the seven cuts that make them. Each is 14.17 g, which USDA rounds to 14 g. Half a stick is four tablespoons, a quarter stick is two.

How many sticks is a 250 g block of butter?

2.205 sticks — about 2.2. There is no tidy answer, because the two packaging systems were never designed to relate: the stick is a quarter of an avoirdupois pound and the block is a round number of grams. For a recipe asking for 2 sticks, cut 227 g off the block and keep the rest.

Does European butter come in sticks?

No. Butter in most of Europe is sold as a block, usually 250 g, with no tablespoon markings and no stick to cut. That is the whole reason this page exists: the conversion is not a unit conversion, it is a translation between two ways of packaging the same food.

Can I swap salted butter for unsalted?

Yes, but adjust the salt elsewhere in the recipe, and how much depends on the butter: salt in butter runs from roughly 1% to 2% by mass, and manufacturers do not all declare it. USDA’s entries for salted (173410) and unsalted (173430) butter carry identical portion weights, so the conversion arithmetic on this page is the same either way. For working out what the swap does to the salt in the recipe, and why a teaspoon of one salt is not a teaspoon of another, use the salt conversion calculator.

Is a cup of butter the same as a cup of anything else?

No, and that is the trap. A cup of butter is a defined half pound. A cup of flour, sugar or oil is a genuine volume filled with a genuine density, and the answer changes with the ingredient. The cups to grams converter does those.

Related calculators

References

U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service. FoodData Central, SR Legacy. fdc.nal.usda.gov. A work of the United States Government and in the public domain. The gram weights for household measures used on this page are the food portions USDA publishes with each food, and the FDC id of each is given in the table.
Cabot Creamery. How many tablespoons in a stick of butter? Used for the wrapper markings and for the statement that a 250 g block is approximately 2.2 sticks, which this page reproduces as 2.2046.
U.S. Department of Agriculture, FoodData Central: Butter, salted (FDC 173410), Butter, without salt (173430) and Ghee / butter oil, anhydrous (173412). The last is the source of the 205 g per cup figure used as a bound on what measuring melted butter costs.
National Institute of Standards and Technology. NIST Handbook 44 (2026 edition), Appendix C, General Tables of Units of Measurement. The US liquid gallon is 231 cubic inches exactly and the British imperial gallon is 4.546 09 L exactly; every volume on this page is derived from those two definitions and the exact inch.
The international avoirdupois pound is 0.453 592 37 kg exactly, agreed in 1959 by the national standards laboratories of the Commonwealth and the United States; every figure on this page descends from it.