Why "1 cup = 240g" is wrong
A cup measures volume; a gram measures weight. What connects them is density, so the conversion differs per ingredient. A cup of flour is 125g and a cup of honey is 340g — nearly three times as much.
Even the same flour runs 125g spooned and levelled, or up to 150g scooped and packed. Which is why baking, where ratios matter, uses scales rather than cups. This tool is for translating a cup-based recipe into grams; when accuracy matters, the answer is a scale.
Not all cups are the same
- US cup = 240ml — the default in English-language recipes.
- Korean paper cup = 180ml — common in Korean home recipes. Mistake it for a US cup and you are 33% out.
- Tablespoon = 15ml, teaspoon = 5ml — these are effectively universal.
Salt deserves special care
A cup of fine table salt is 288g; a cup of coarse salt is about 150g. It is nearly twice as salty by volume, which makes "1 tsp salt" an unreliable instruction. The full reasoning is in Salt.
These densities are the widely published approximations. Depending on moisture, grind and packing, expect ±10%.