The litre or liter (see spelling differences) is a unit of volume. There are two official symbols: the Latin letter L in lower and upper case (l and L). The lower case L is also often written as a cursive ℓ, though this symbol has no official approval by any international bureau. Although the litre is not an SI unit, it is accepted for use with the SI,Bureau International des Poids et Mesures, 2006, p. 124. ("Days" and "hours" are examples of other non-SI units that SI accepts.) and has appeared in several versions of the metric system. The official SI unit of volume is the cubic metre (m3). One litre is equal to 0.001 cubic metre and is denoted as 1 cubic decimetre (dm3).
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The litre or liter (see spelling differences) is a unit of volume. There are two official symbols: the Latin letter L in lower and upper case (l and L). The lower case L is also often written as a cursive ℓ, though this symbol has no official approval by any international bureau. Although the litre is not an SI unit, it is accepted for use with the SI,Bureau International des Poids et Mesures, 2006, p. 124. ("Days" and "hours" are examples of other non-SI units that SI accepts.) and has appeared in several versions of the metric system. The official SI unit of volume is the cubic metre (m3). One litre is equal to 0.001 cubic metre and is denoted as 1 cubic decimetre (dm3).
The word litre is derived from an older French unit, the litron, whose name came from Greek via Latin. The original French metric system used the litre as a base unit.
The spelling of the word used
Definition
A litre is defined as a special name for a cubic decimetre (1 L = 1 dm3 = 103 cm3). Hence 1 L ≡ 0.001 m3 (exactly). So 1000 L = 1 m3
From 1901 to 1964 the litre was defined as the volume of one kilogram of pure water at 4°C and 760 millimetres of mercury pressure. During this time, a litre was about 1.000028 dm3. In 1964 this definition was abandoned in favor of the current one.
SI prefixes applied to the litre
The litre may be used with any SI prefix. The most commonly used is the millilitre, defined as one-thousandth of a litre, and also often referred to using the non-SI name of "cubic centimetre". It is a commonly used measurement, especially in medicine and cooking. Other units may be found in the table below, the more often used terms are in bold.
Rough conversions
One litre is slightly more than one U.S. liquid quart and slightly less than one Imperial quart or the less common U.S. dry quart.
A measured cup is roughly 250 mL.
A litre is the volume of a cube with sides of 10 cm, which is slightly less than a cube of sides 4 inches (or one-third of a foot). Twenty-seven cubes "one-third of a foot on each side" would fit in one cubic foot, which is within 5% of the actual value of exactly 28.316846592 litres.
A nice aide-memoire is: "A litre of water's a pint and three quarters" (Imperial pints, that is). Or, simpler: "A litre is a kilo of water" (the litre was once defined in a way that made this exactly true under certain conditions).
Explanation
Litres are most commonly used for items (such as fluids and berries) which are measured by the capacity or size of their container, whereas cubic metres (and derived units) are most commonly used for items measured either by their dimensions or their displacements. The litre is often also used in some calculated measurements, such as density (kg/L), allowing an easy comparison with the density of water.
