Bigha Converter — State by State
Bigha Converter — State by State
How big is a bigha? Between 6,806 and 27,225 square feet, depending on which state’s revenue record the land sits in — a factor of four. This page gives the published value for each system, the pucca and kaccha distinction, how the bigha divides into biswa, katha and dhur, and the same holding read under every other state’s definition so you can see what is at stake.
Bigha, by revenue system
1 bigha in eastern Uttar Pradesh
The bigha and its parts
- pucca bigha
- the full revenue bigha, 20 biswa, 27,225 sq ft
- kaccha bigha
- a local fraction of it — 5 or 6⅔ biswa in western UP
- biswa
- 1/20 of a pucca bigha in UP and Rajasthan (1,361.25 sq ft); 4 marlas in Punjab (1,089 sq ft)
- katha
- 1/20 bigha in Bengal and Bihar, 1/5 bigha in upper Assam
- dhur
- 1/20 katha, so 68.06 sq ft where the Bihar and UP katha is 1,361.25
Worked example
1 bigha in eastern Uttar Pradesh
The pucca bigha is 20 biswa, each 151.25 square yards
20 × 151.25 = 3,025 sq yd, and 3,025 × 9 = 27,225 sq ft
That is 0.625 acre exactly, or 2,529.29 m²
The same one bigha in West Bengal is 14,400 sq ft and in the Uttarakhand hills 6,806.25 sq ft — a factor of 4 between the two extremes
An error of 12,825 sq ft — nearly three tenths of an acre — on a single bigha is why this page exists
The bigha, by revenue system
| Revenue system | Bigha (sq ft) | Katha (sq ft) | Biswa (sq ft) | Dhur (sq ft) | Bigha in acres |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Uttar Pradesh — pucca bigha (east UP, Lucknow) | 27,225 | 1,361.25 (20 to the bigha) | 1,361.25 (20 to the bigha) | 68.06 | 0.6250 |
| Uttar Pradesh — kaccha bigha, 5 biswa (west UP) | 6,806.25 | 1,361.25 (5 to the bigha) | 1,361.25 (5 to the bigha) | 68.06 | 0.1563 |
| Uttar Pradesh — kaccha bigha, 6⅔ biswa (west UP) | 9,075 | 1,361.25 (6⅔ to the bigha) | 1,361.25 (6⅔ to the bigha) | 68.06 | 0.2083 |
| Bihar — Patna and Arrah | 27,225 | 1,361.25 (20 to the bigha) | not used | 68.06 | 0.6250 |
| West Bengal, and Bangladesh | 14,400 | 720 (20 to the bigha) | not used | not used | 0.3306 |
| Assam | 14,400 | 2,880 (5 to the bigha) | not used | not used | 0.3306 |
| Rajasthan — pucca bigha | 27,225 | not used | 1,361.25 (20 to the bigha) | not used | 0.6250 |
| Rajasthan — kaccha bigha | 17,424 | not used | 871.20 (20 to the bigha) | not used | 0.4000 |
| Punjab and Haryana | 21,780 | not used | 1,089 (20 to the bigha) | not used | 0.5000 |
| Himachal Pradesh | 8,712 | not used | 435.60 (20 to the bigha) | not used | 0.2000 |
| Madhya Pradesh | 12,000 | 600 (20 to the bigha) | not used | not used | 0.2755 |
| Uttarakhand — hill districts | 6,806.25 | not used | not used | not used | 0.1563 |
| Uttarakhand — plains | 17,424 | not used | not used | not used | 0.4000 |
One bigha, drawn as a plot
| Bigha (sq ft) | As a square | In acres | In hectares | In square metres |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 27,225 | 165.0 ft × 165.0 ft | 0.6250 | 0.2529 | 2,529.29 |
| 21,780 | 147.6 ft × 147.6 ft | 0.5000 | 0.2023 | 2,023.43 |
| 17,424 | 132.0 ft × 132.0 ft | 0.4000 | 0.1619 | 1,618.74 |
| 14,400 | 120.0 ft × 120.0 ft | 0.3306 | 0.1338 | 1,337.80 |
| 12,000 | 109.5 ft × 109.5 ft | 0.2755 | 0.1115 | 1,114.84 |
| 9,075 | 95.3 ft × 95.3 ft | 0.2083 | 0.0843 | 843.10 |
| 8,712 | 93.3 ft × 93.3 ft | 0.2000 | 0.0809 | 809.37 |
| 6,806.25 | 82.5 ft × 82.5 ft | 0.1563 | 0.0632 | 632.32 |
How big is a bigha, honestly
There is no answer to “how many square feet in a bigha” that is true everywhere, and any page that gives you one number is guessing on your behalf. The bigha is a revenue unit. It was recorded district by district under the Mughal and then the British land settlements, and when India metricated nobody went back and made the bigha uniform, because the bigha is not a legal unit of the registry — square metres are. What survived is a family of local bighas that run from 6,806.25 sq ft to 27,225 sq ft, a factor of four from end to end.
Pucca and kaccha. The pucca or pakka bigha is the full revenue bigha: twenty biswa of 151.25 square yards each, so 3,025 square yards, 27,225 sq ft, exactly five eighths of an acre. A kaccha bigha is a local fraction of it, and the crucial point is which quantity changes. The biswa stays 1,361.25 sq ft; what changes is how many biswa the local usage counts to a bigha — twenty for pucca, five or six and two thirds in parts of western Uttar Pradesh. So a deed that says “3 bighas” can mean 20,419 sq ft or 81,675 sq ft in the same state, and the only thing that settles it is the record.
It is not always a state-level answer. Bihar is the sharpest example. The katha, which is one twentieth of the Bihar bigha, is published at 1,361.25 sq ft around Patna and Arrah, 1,742.4 sq ft in Chhapra, 1,901.25 in Hajipur and 3,267 in Bettiah. Those are not rounding differences, they are different units, and they imply Bihar bighas from 27,225 to 65,340 sq ft. This page uses the Patna and Arrah figure for Bihar and labels it, rather than averaging four real numbers into one fake one.
Where the sources run out. The state values here are the commonly published revenue figures, cross-checked against each system’s own arithmetic — twenty biswa or twenty katha to the bigha, four kanals to the Punjab bigha, five Himachal bighas to the acre. The state notifications themselves could not be retrieved, so treat every figure as a strong indication and not as an authority. Your khasra, patta or sale deed is the authority. If that document gives an area in square metres alongside the local unit, divide one by the other and you have your district’s bigha, which beats every chart on the internet including this one.
For the other Indian land units, most of which are fixed and much less trouble, use the Indian land area converter. If you are comparing prices rather than areas, the land price per unit converter will put a rate per bigha and a rate per square foot on the same footing. This page does the arithmetic. Where the answer carries a consequence — a dose, a structural load, a legal area, a medical measure — confirm it against the authority that governs it before relying on it.
Frequently asked questions
How many square feet is 1 bigha?
Between 6,806.25 and 27,225, depending on the district. The pucca bigha of eastern Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Rajasthan is 27,225 sq ft; West Bengal and Assam use 14,400; Punjab and Haryana 21,780; Madhya Pradesh 12,000; Himachal Pradesh 8,712; the Uttarakhand hills 6,806.25.
How many bighas in an acre?
It depends on the bigha. 1.6 in eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, 2 in Punjab and Haryana, 2.5 in Rajasthan’s kaccha system, 3.025 in West Bengal, 3.63 in Madhya Pradesh, 5 in Himachal Pradesh and 6.4 in the Uttarakhand hills.
What is the difference between a pucca and a kaccha bigha?
The pucca bigha is the full revenue bigha of twenty biswa. A kaccha bigha counts fewer biswa to the bigha — five or six and two thirds in western Uttar Pradesh — while the biswa itself stays the same size. The pucca reading can be four times the kaccha one.
How many biswa in a bigha?
Twenty, in the pucca system of Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, and also in the Punjab and Himachal systems — but the biswa is a different size in each, 1,361.25 sq ft in UP, 1,089 in Punjab and 435.6 in Himachal Pradesh. In a kaccha bigha the count itself is five or six and two thirds.
Is the bigha a legal unit?
No. Sale deeds and registry records are kept in square metres. The bigha is a revenue and conversational unit, which is precisely why it was never standardised.
My deed’s bigha does not match this page. Which is right?
The deed. Divide the area it states in square metres by the number of bighas it states and you have your own district’s bigha; that figure beats any published chart, including this one.
Related calculators
References
- Wikipedia, Bigha (read 26 September 2026) — the state-by-state table used here, which carries a separate reference per row. The state revenue notifications behind those rows could not be retrieved, so the values are presented as the commonly published revenue figures and cross-checked for internal consistency instead (20 biswa or 20 katha to the bigha).
- Wikipedia, Katha (unit) (read 26 September 2026) — district-level katha values, including the four different Bihar figures (Patna and Arrah 1,361.25 sq ft, Chhapra 1,742.4, Hajipur 1,901.25, Bettiah 3,267) that make a single state-wide Bihar number impossible to state honestly.
- Wikipedia, Measurement of land in Punjab (read 26 September 2026), citing the Punjab Weight and Measurement Act 1976: sarsahi 30.25 sq ft, marla 272.25, biswa 1,089, kanal 5,445, bigha 21,780, killa 43,560. The Act itself could not be retrieved; the six values are mutually consistent and consistent with the 8-kanal acre.
- International yard and pound agreement, 1959, as adopted in India by the Standards of Weights and Measures Act: the yard is 0.9144 m exactly. Every imperial figure on this page follows from it — 1 acre = 4,840 sq yd = 43,560 sq ft = 4,046.8564224 m², exactly.
- Wikipedia, Cent (area) and Gunta and Ankanam and Ground (unit) (read 26 September 2026) — the cent as one hundredth of an acre, the guntha as one fortieth, the ankanam at 72 sq ft (Kittel, A Kannada-English Dictionary) and the ground at 2,400 sq ft.