# Football fields as measurement **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 22, 2014, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711 "2014-04-22T20:20:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/1 "2014-04-22T20:20:50Z")
Here in the U.S., when trying to convey a large area, we say “x number of football fields,” and most people can imagine the size. But for other countries that don’t play American football, what unit of measurement to they use? Obviously a soccer field can be used, but what about places where they don’t have a handy reference? ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/2 "2014-04-22T20:23:47Z")
[Hectare](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hectare). ---
**Author:** ![polar\_bear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ec9cab/32.png) [@polar\_bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/polar_bear)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/3 "2014-04-22T20:45:30Z")
Actually, soccer fields are a fairly common way of doing this. In the Netherlands at least. ---
**Author:** ![Blakeyrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecd19e/32.png) [@Blakeyrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blakeyrat)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/4 "2014-04-22T20:46:33Z")
What really bothers me is that people use “football field” as shorthand for 100 yards, but a football field is 120 yards long. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/5 "2014-04-22T20:48:23Z")
Can’t soccer fields vary significantly in size, though? I seem to recall that you can fit more than two regulation soccer fields in a single regulation soccer field. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/6 "2014-04-22T20:57:18Z")
Wikipedia [says](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soccer_pitch) the dimensions can vary, but not to the point of becoming fractals. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/7 "2014-04-22T21:03:56Z")
From that same page, the width can be anywhere from 50 to 100 yards. So you could put two narrow fields side by side in a single wide field. Plus the length can vary, too. ---
**Author:** ![Batistuta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/58956e/32.png) [@Batistuta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Batistuta)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/8 "2014-04-22T21:04:45Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Can’t soccer fields vary significantly in size, though? I seem to recall that you can fit more than two regulation soccer fields in a single regulation soccer field. Nah, they’re always around 100m x 70m, give or take 5 metres each way. The ‘football field’ measurement is very common in Spain (particularly when measuring how large a forest fire is, for some reason). EDIT: the smaller measurements given on wikipedia are probably applied to 7-a-side football instead of 11-a-side. But trust me, when people in Europe talk about a football pitch they think of the 100m x 70m pitches of the big leagues 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Dahu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dahu/32/3416_2.png) [@Dahu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dahu)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/9 "2014-04-22T21:40:45Z")
The Football Field is a standard unit of measurement in the UK. As is the Bus, and the Wales. The Belgium is another. ---
**Author:** ![drewtwo99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d07c76/32.png) [@drewtwo99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewtwo99)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/10 "2014-04-22T21:49:30Z")
> [@Dahu](#): > > The Football Field is a standard unit of measurement in the UK. As is the Bus, and the Wales. The Belgium is another. I was about to ask the tangential question of how the rest of the world gets by without the standard unit of The Rhode Island, but it seems you’ve answered that more or less. ---
**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/11 "2014-04-23T02:25:53Z")
And I was going to ask the size of a football field in microRhodeIslands. I’m guessing in the high hundreds? ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/12 "2014-04-23T03:34:57Z")
> [@Dahu](#): > > The Football Field is a standard unit of measurement in the UK. As is the Bus, and the Wales. The Belgium is another. I hadn’t encountered the Wales or the Belgium before, but I’ve encountered both the football field (Spain, Italy, Costa Rica, France, Brazil (where they also have the Maracaná, which in this case includes the whole stadium and not just the pitch), Mexico, Germany) and the bus. The bus may occasionally get specified further: double decker, or extra long. ---
**Author:** ![RadicalPi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/radicalpi/32/9806_2.png) [@RadicalPi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RadicalPi)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/13 "2014-04-23T06:36:18Z")
> [@Napier](#): > > And I was going to ask the size of a football field in microRhodeIslands. I’m guessing in the high hundreds? Calculations give me a total of 500,364 American football fields could fit in Rhode Island (without overlapping). ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/14 "2014-04-23T07:32:43Z")
The UKSI units of biggishness go thusly. The mini The bus The tennis court The olympic sized swimming pool The football pitch The Isle of Wight The Wales (The Belgium was mentioned upthread but that is an attempt by the dreaded E.U. to force their units on us) ---
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_Panic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/don_t_panic/32/398_2.png) [@Don\_t\_Panic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_Panic)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/15 "2014-04-23T07:33:57Z")
[Handy size of Wales area conversion tool](http://www.simonkelk.co.uk/sizeofwales.html) (also includes the standard units of London bus, Nelson’s column and Olympic swimming pool, for length, height and volume, respectively). ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 8:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/16 "2014-04-23T08:33:44Z")
Don’t forget the Empire State Building, the Eiffel Tower, the Human Hair, and the Period at the End of This Sentence. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/17 "2014-04-23T11:58:11Z")
> [@Blakeyrat](#): > > What really bothers me is that people use “football field” as shorthand for 100 yards, but a football field is 120 yards long. 140 in Canada. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/18 "2014-04-23T12:32:01Z")
For things that blow up, some town in a group of Islands off the eastern coast of Eurasia. ---
**Author:** ![MrKnowItAll](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrknowitall/32/87_2.png) [@MrKnowItAll](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrKnowItAll)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/19 "2014-04-23T12:33:24Z")
Actually, Canadian football fields are 150 yards, Loach. 110 yards from goal line to goal line, and two endzones of 20 yards each. ---
**Author:** ![Quercus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/7ab992/32.png) [@Quercus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711/20 "2014-04-23T12:51:31Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > From that same page, the width can be anywhere from 50 to 100 yards. So you could put two narrow fields side by side in a single wide field. Plus the length can vary, too. You could have read another sentence or two longer: [QUOTE=Wikipedia] However, in international matches, the goal lines must be between 64 and 75 m (70 and 80 yd) long and the touchlines must be between 100 and 110 m (110 and 120 yd).[ [/QUOTE] Which, theoretically could be a 37% difference in area at the extremes, but is close enough for an order-of-magnitude description unit. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/football-fields-as-measurement/686711.md?page=2)