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Pressure Unit Converter

Convert engineering quantities quickly and consistently.

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Manual Conversion Shortcut

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Equivalent Units

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Standard Reference Tables

SI System
Unit Equivalent
1 Pascal (Pa) 1 N/m² = 10⁻⁵ bar
1 bar 100 kPa = 0.1 MPa
FPS System
Unit Equivalent
1 psi (lbf/in²) 144 psf = 0.0689 bar
1 atm 14.696 psi
CGS System
Unit Equivalent
1 Barye (Ba) 1 dyne/cm² = 0.1 Pa
1 kgf/cm² 0.9806 bar

Pressure

What is Pressure?

In chemical and process engineering, pressure is defined as the force exerted per unit area by a fluid on its surroundings. Accurately converting pressure units is a fundamental step in thermodynamic calculations, process simulation, and equipment design.

Engineers rely on precise pressure unit conversions for:

  • Pump and Compressor Hydraulics: Calculating total dynamic head (TDH) and discharge pressures.
  • Vessel Sizing: Determining the Maximum Allowable Working Pressure (MAWP) for reactors and separators.
  • Phase Envelopes: Mapping vapor-liquid equilibrium (VLE) and boiling points.

Common conversions involve translating between absolute and gauge pressures (e.g., barg to psia), as well as moving between metric (bar, kPa, MPa) and imperial (psi, atm) systems used by ASME and API standards.