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Speed

Mach to kilometres per hour

1 Mach = 1 225.04 km/h

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Mach 1 is 1,225.044 kilometres per hour on this site — but that figure is only true under specific conditions. Mach is not a speed at all: it is a ratio to the local speed of sound, and the local speed of sound changes with temperature.

About the units

The Mach number is named after Ernst Mach and expresses speed as a fraction of the speed of sound in the surrounding medium. The value used here corresponds to 340.29 metres per second, the speed of sound in dry air at 15 °C at sea level — the International Standard Atmosphere reference. At altitude the air is colder and sound travels more slowly: at 11,000 metres, where the temperature is about −56 °C, the speed of sound is 295 m/s, so Mach 1 is only 1,062 km/h. This is why an aircraft can cross Mach 1 by climbing at constant airspeed, and why supersonic flight is easier high up.

The exact factor

Using the sea-level standard value, Mach 1 is 340.29 m/s or 1,225.044 km/h. The dependence is on temperature alone, not pressure or altitude directly: the speed of sound in an ideal gas goes as the square root of absolute temperature. Practical reference points: Concorde cruised at Mach 2.02, about 2,140 km/h at cruise altitude; a typical airliner cruises at Mach 0.78 to 0.85; and the fastest air-breathing aircraft, the SR-71, exceeded Mach 3.2.

Where you meet this conversion

Aviation and aerodynamics. Aircraft are limited by Mach number rather than by airspeed at high altitude, because the onset of shock waves depends on the ratio and not the absolute speed — which is why airliner cockpits display both indicated airspeed and Mach, and switch which one is limiting as the aircraft climbs. Rocketry, ballistics and wind tunnel testing all use it. The number also appears in weapons specifications, where it is often quoted without stating the reference conditions, making a direct conversion to kilometres per hour unreliable.

Common values

Value (Mach) Converted (km/h)
1 1 225.04
2 2 450.09
5 6 125.22
10 12 250.4
25 30 626.1
50 61 252.2
100 122 504
500 612 522
1 000 1 225 040

Values are rounded for reading. The converter above keeps full precision.

The other way around

1 km/h = 0.000816297 Mach

Kilometres per hour to Mach divides by 1,225.044 at sea level in standard conditions. For anything above a few thousand metres that division gives too low a Mach number, and the local temperature has to be used instead.

Value (km/h) Converted (Mach)
1 0.000816297
2 0.00163259
5 0.00408149
10 0.00816297
25 0.0204074
50 0.0408149
100 0.0816297
500 0.408149
1 000 0.816297

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