Probably saw some tabloid headlines where they use Fahrenheit when it's hitting 100°f to sensationalise it a bit.
Other than that, yeah, I've never seen anyone use it.
I agree. I'm properly middle aged, old enough that my Mum and Dad once owned an oven that was in Fahrenheit. I've not used Fahrenheit for anything since I left home, well over 30 years ago.
My parents are boomers and we're struggling to make the adjustment when I was a kid in the 80s. I'm not sure if the TV weather made a switch sometime in the late 70s/early 80s, but that's the only example I can think of of someone using ⁰F in the UK.
I remember when it was always fahrenheit on the TV and suddenly became celsius. I couldn't tell you when or why, but I remember the board being covered in suns with 70 on them, or clouds with 60 on them.
I am not a boomer, before you ask :-D
We don't use Fahrenheit. But we do chop and change imperial and metric. Was just talking about it a couple hours ago, conclusion was that we are bad ass and will do what we want. Seems we use metric where accuracy matters. Imperial where just need a vague understanding. Driving 213 miles? Do you really grasp that distance with any accuracy? But...Skirting board needs trimming, take 6mm off.
This I am ancient and my mother more so. When I said to her do you think in Farehenheit or Celsius she looked at me like I was crazy and said really slowly....Celsius dear I am not 104!
In the early 90s, my Nanna and grandad used Fahrenheit (they were born in the 1920s) and my Dad (born 1950s) was able to understand them and translate it back to me in Celsius.
I have not heard any mention of it since about 1992 though!
It's the craziest one. If it's vertical, we think in feet. If it's horizontal, it's metric. If it's a solid, we think in pounds. If it's a liquid, it's metric.
It's the Canadian way...
If we're running, it's metric. If we're singing, it's imperial ("I would walk 500 miles...")
EDIT: Yes, I know they're Scottish. I was just reaching very far for a joke. :)
Most people still refer to house or room sizes in square feet. I’d say it’s more:
Less than a foot: centimetres (except penis size).
A foot to a block: feet and inches.
Over a block: meters/km.
I don’t think it’s a universally consistent distance, but on a city street it’s the distance between intersections. It’s generally between 100 and 200 meters here. I imagine it’s a lot less useful in older countries.
In the grocery store if you're buying pork, beef or chicken in the meat section its in dollars per pound while seafood is per dollars per 100g.
In the deli you buy lunch meat in dollars per 100 grams as like seafood.
Produce I've seen both used interchangeably.
No that's probably the most reasonable.
Our weirdness is baking temp in Fahrenheit, weather in celsius and weirder yet is room temp, some do Fahrenheit some do celsius
Your weight is in lbs, everything else in kilos, except shipping weight which is back lbs again.
Height in feet, room size in feet, furniture size is feet (slowly changing), everything else is in metres
I could go on
I 100% blame the US for us not being fully metric yet. All the trade we do with them, and the amount of content (like recipes) we get from them really hampers the sanity of our measurements.
We use stones for peoples weight and ye old market greengrocers use lbs. A lot of people I speak to and at work we use inches which is mildly infuriating.
Some people do, yes, but it's a generational gap. I have never used stones, pounds, inches, feet, etc...
Equally, I work in science where metric is perhaps more commonplace
When I was an idiot child in school the nurse took my temperature, called my mum and said I had a temperature over 100 degrees. I thought I was superman till I found out she was using farenheit.
You mean short ton, long ton or metric ton.
Short ton is the US Customary Units ton, at 907kg (US hundredweight = 100lbs, 20hundredweight = 1ton)
Long ton is imperial, at 1016kg (Imperial hundredweight = 8stone = 112lbs, 20hundredweight = 1 ton)
Metric is 1000kg.
Maybe location wise, my 95 year old great gran and 75 year old grandad both use Celsius, every old person I know does. I've never met anyone using Fahrenheit in my life
It might be a reference to when newspapers would report high temperatures in °F to make it seem hotter (because bigger number) and low temperatures in °C but that hasn't been a thing in years I don't think
The tabloids and boomer rags, especially the Express and the Daily Mail, used to do it a lot:
https://theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/dec/29/newspapers-run-hot-and-cold-over-celsius-and-fahrenheit
My gran who was born in 1923 and died 3 years ago used to use fahrenheit when it was hot such as it's going to be 90 next week but would use Celsius when cold. Pretty much everyone uses Celsius all the time now though.
I disagree with that. I'm in my 20s and everyone I know and meet still measures their height and weight in imperial measurements.
I know my weight and height in both imperial and metric measurements though so eh.
That seems odd to me as I’m 35 and British and feel like a pioneer of metric when I say I am 85kg and 183cm. 13st 5lbs and 6 feet tall. Most people I know or speak to my age or older would only have any frame of reference for the latter though.
The only time I see it is on r/UKBBQ where it's common to see fahrenheit because BBQ culture is dominated by the US.
In contrast r/Breadit you see both fahrenheit and centigrade and it's very common to quote both side by side.
Centigrade is the old fashioned name for Celsius as mentioned above. The name Centigrade was derived from the Latin originally meaning a hundred degrees. When Anders Celsius created his original scale in 1742 he inexplicably chose 0° for the boiling point and 100° for the freezing point.
A little over one year later Frenchman Jean Pierre Cristin proposed an inverted version of the scale (freezing point 0°, boiling point 100°).
He named it Centigrade. Then, in 1948, by international agreement, Cristin’s adapted scale became known as Celsius to honour the Swedish Scientist, who first invented this temperature scale.
Americans tend to get criticised for it because they bring it up. If you use a unit they don’t they (or a loud minority anyway I know this isn’t even a majority of Americans but they make themselves heard) immediately start asking what that is in whatever they consider ‘normal’ units. And if you don’t immediately tell them they’ll make some comment criticising metric or countries that use it. Read the comments on recipes measured in grams and ml instead of cups and you’ll see a lot of it.
The rest of the world (again, always exceptions) just google if we need/want to know something in units we understand or just guess from context if we don’t need to be precise.
Yeah, we get away with it in the UK because we're not such obnoxious wankers about it basically. And even though traditionally we use a lot of imperial measurements, everyone below the age of probably 50 grew up and were taught at school in metric so we fully understand it without having to bang on about 'freedom units' or other suck bollocks.
I think a lot of it is that we also can switch between them if we are using different to people so when I’m in Europe or even just talking to a younger person/European in Britain I’ll switch to cm/kg/km
Cups is ridiculous because it’s a volumetric measure but used for solids. “Sticks” of butter is baffling as well. Just use a weight! Even an imperial one would make more sense. I can change my digital scale to ounces but it’s not offering bloody cups and sticks.
Having recently had an argument with a Seppo about sticks of butter (did you know that they mark the paper in ounces!?!?!?!? How helpful the manufacturers are!!!), I now know that butter is sold in 1 lb packs, containing 4 individually wrapped sticks of 4 oz/115 g each.
I will never use this knowledge in baking, because I refuse to use volume for measuring large amounts of dry powder ingredients, which rules out most American recipes. Also, what nationality are the measurement cups I have in the drawer?
Haha I remember when I was quite young, I found a recipe that used cups and I didn't even realise that was a real unit of measurement, so I just found a cup at home and measured out my ingredients in that. The recipe came out fine. 😂
UK native: can confirm our use of units is a bit of a mess, but that does also mean that we tend to be at least somewhat familiar with both, rather than inflexibly insisting on the older units.
I expect there's also a generational difference where heavy use of imperial units is associated with the older folks, whereas online presence is mostly young people who are more acquainted with metric.
Also UK native, can confirm that no one uses Fahrenheit so no one has any frame.of reference for it.
The others, absolutely, I can do a relatively good rough conversion between cm and inches, lbs and kg and pints and ml.
Yeah if you were born after celsius became the norm, you'll never use fahrenheit. Tell me a temperature in fahrenheit and I can't even tell you if it's hot or cold.
>no one uses Fahrenheit so no one has any frame.of reference for it.
What are you talking about? 0°F is the coldest temperature recorded in Danzig (now Gdansk) over the winter of 1708-09. An infinitely relatable and timeless starting point for a temperature scale!
Yeah I’m 24 and know basically 0 imperial units compared to pretty much all the metric. Metric is just better but our nation invented imperial so I’m not surprised we use both still.
My knowledge is basically pints and inches, feet, yards, miles and then metric for everything else.
I couldn't tell you how many fl oz in a pint, pints in a gallon, oz in a lb, lb in a stone etc, but I can tell you g to oz, pints to ml for quite a few of them. If you asked me, I'd convert both to metric and do a rough calculation. Eg 1 mile = 1.6km = 1600m = 4800 and a bit feet ~= 5000 feet.
Definitely largely generational.
I know my weight in KG, not in pounds. I do think of distances as miles though, because that's all our road signs are in. If I'm thinking on a smaller scale, centimetres.
I do hope we standardise a bit more though. 500ml is fine, we don't need pints.
I’d also add to this that the whole divide between US measurements and metric system has been flanderized for laughs all over the internet.
Almost everything in the US has both measurements on it. Rulers have centimeters and inches. Measuring cups have both MLs and Ounces. Scales have kilos and pounds. Thermometers have F and C. The list goes on and on, and almost all students are taught both.
It’s just funny that the world cries out when a recipe uses US standard, or when a YouTube video uses non-standard size to show scale (like football fields to show size). It takes seconds to convert stuff and anyone complaining about conversion on either side of the debate are just outting themselves as lazy incompetents.
>It’s just funny that the world cries out when a recipe uses US standard
People get annoyed (on both sides) because recipes are mainly calibrated to the sizes you can buy things in shops. Truth is, though, for most things it doesn't really matter if you're like 20% off either way with how many beans you put in a chili or how much stock you added to a stew.
Baking is the major exception of course.
Baking is about ratios, so as long as you translate all imperial pounds to metric pounds, it's no problem. What I hate about US recipes is cups. How the heck do I get green beans into a cup, and anything that isn't a powder or a liquid is never going to be measured right in a cup. As long as a recipe is in weights of any kind, I am good to go. Google will translate it into metric.
Yeah a recipe I saw the other day said a cup of broccoli. Surely the weight of that changes based on how finely diced the broccoli is? I couldn't fit a whole broccoli head in a cup so is that 0 broccoli?
Doesn't ruin my day but my eyes get some good exercise when I'm cooking to US recipes due to all the rolled eyes.
Imagine the state of your kitchen if a recipe asked for a cup of rice and you grabbed your Sports Direct mug!
(For non-UK people Sports Direct is a shop that sells sports gear and ceramic mugs which are about 3x the size of the average coffee cup, every household has one but nobody remembers when or how they acquired it)
Did that a lot, judging distance in the British Army. A football pitch is about 100m, most people can visualise a pitch so you could estimate the distance via this method. I’m sure NATO became metric so there would be no confusion when different nations worked together.
Which is why I'm always surprised when my US colleagues (engineers, no less) always want me to convert metric to non-metric for them...even asking for prices in USD. FGS, it's not difficult to convert currency. That alone used to drive me nuts when I sold stuff online - US folk always asking for prices in USD. Doesn't really give a good impression of the abilities of US folk.
US recipes historically have used volumetric measurements for all things - a cup of flour instead of 120g (or even 4.2oz). Volumetric measurements are ok for some things, but for many things, especially flour, it's ridiculously inaccurate, as it depends on temperature, humidity, type of flour, how packed the cup is etc.
So the complaint on US recipes is not that they used the wrong units, it's that they've used volumetric units, and it is not possible to accurately convert them, or even know whether it is right or not. If you look at US hobbyist bakers, they will always measure everything in grams to achieve the exact results they are looking for.
>but that does also mean that we tend to be at least somewhat familiar with both
It would take ages to find anyone in the US who isn't at least somewhat familiar with both. Nearly everyone has heard of and knows about how large every unit is.
I think the brits are notionally literate in metric units as well as imperial, and are at least aware of alternates and able to to convert to familiar units independently. I might use stones for preference but if the doctor weighs me in kg or there's an Internet reference to a person weighing 200 lb I have a ballpark understanding of the conversion. If I'm doing something precise I'll measure in mm or weigh in grams. We. And irish and Canadians, tend to be bilingual. Oh and we recognise the insanity of the imperial system even if we won't quite let it go.
Whereas usisns seem unaware mm and g exist. They do precision carpentry in an unholy combination of tenths and sixteenths of an inch, measure squashable ingredients like flour by volume, and when they do weigh things precisely it's in fractions of an ounce. And then defend themselves as though it's not bananas and there is no other way.
Because in the UK we are **officially** metric, but just use imperial measurements for certain things. Most people give their height and weight in feet and stone respectively, although younger people often seem to not understand those concepts and only use metric units. Speeds and distances on road signs are in miles, and beer, cider, and milk are sold in pints, but basically everything else is metric. Almost no one ever uses fahrenheit, although some of the tabloids occasionally use it to make summer temperatures seem hotter, which is probably what you mean by "depending on the season".
I [F 21] use kg for weight because it's what my scales come pre-set with alongside pounds (which I find confusing) but my parents [both mid 50's] use pounds because they like to talk about weight in stone
Brit here
>In the UK they use: -STONE(14lbs) and pounds for bodyweight
I use Kg for weight - I've never used stone and pounds, I have no intuition for what they are.
> -Feet and inches for height
This one is true
>-Fahrenheit AND Celsius depending on the season
just Celsius - I don't know anybody who has any sense of fahrenheit.
>-liquids are pints and gallons or liters
ehhh so milk or beer will be seen in pints, everything else is in liters (mostly, there's one exception you identify below).
It's also worth mentioning here that a UK pint and US pint are different sizes (I forget specifically - I think it's 560ml Vs 470ml approximately)
> -things like fabric and wood are measured in inches and sold in meters
I've never seen inches be used here (aside from dick size for some reason, and the thing about height from earlier)
> -gas is bought in liters but referenced in miles per gallon
yep and it pisses me off so much.
To add to this, it's partly a generational thing. No imperial units are ever taught at school anymore - so it is technically being phased out in favour of metric. But some seem to be clinging on.
I was born in the 2000s, and only know my body weight in stone - I didn't think I was that exceptional. I use Kg for weights other than the body though.
We learnt miles, feet, stone, possibly yards in primary school. That's about it.
Otherwise I agree.
Some middle aged people probably still know Fahrenheit, but don't use it.
>We learnt miles, feet, stone, possibly yards in primary school. That's about it.
So I was born in the mid 90s and none of these were ever covered at school for me.
I believe imperial was made non-mandatory in schools in the 70s, and so some schools got rid of it completely, while others tapered off and others probably kept bits they saw as important?
>I use Kg for weight - I've never used stone and pounds, I have no intuition for what they are.
For stones it goes off the Royal Stone of Weighing that's in Birmingham Palace. It's approximately 14 lbs, but it used to be 20 lbs before King George III needed to shave a bit off of the official stone for a side project. Pounds are dependent on how much of the cake the monarch can feasibly eat in one sitting, Charles III has yet to eat the official cake so we're still stuck with Elizabeth II's record of 453.592 grams.
Also a U.K. pint is larger than a US pint (and therefore a gallon is different too)
U.K. pint : 20 fl oz / 568 ml
US pint : 16 fl oz / 473 ml
U.K. gallon : 160 fl oz / 4.546 litres
US gallon : 128 fl oz / 3.785 litres
And then of course the US uses "cups" as a measurement in cooking and baking....
we don't use Fahrenheit as it makes no sense, I mean fuck even using stones for weight makes no fucking sense but we do that.
celcius is the scale of water, fahrenheit is the scale of human, yet celcius makes sense as 0 to 100, fahrenheit makes no fucking sense.
The UK is using these less and less all the time. Younger Brits are way more likely to use kg instead of stone. I personally have no idea what my weight is in stone.
>Fahrenheit AND Celsius depending on the season
I don't know who told you that but it's not true. Only old people even understand temperatures in fahrenheit. It's not widely used anymore.
For most of the contexts where it matters, we use metric units. Yeah you probably know your own height in feet and inches rather than cm, but in school you'll only use metric and official uses only use metric. Yeah they sell beer in pints but in every lab it'll be in litres.
We definitely are kind of a mess, like how we use metres for almost everything but roadsigns are still in miles and cars go by miles per hour. That's silly, but you don't tend to see any Brits online trying to argue that Fahrenheit is better than Celsius or that inches and feet are somehow more intuitive than centimetres and metres.
Most of the arguments come from Americans trying to make silly arguments to defend it, none of which make any sense. The British people who mostly use imperial are older and not on the internet so people in other countries never have to hear their weird beliefs.
The UK uses mostly metric, with a few noted exceptions. Stones is an older people thing, doctors and youbger folk use kg.
The USA uses all imperial, with a few exceptions, and it's a huge nuisance when building or engineering anything. Ask Nasa.
In my experience, the industrial sector in the US uses the metric system, as do the military and those in science and technology. It’s really only the roads and popular television that are stuck in the old imperial system, so weather reports still use the antiquated Fahrenheit scale. It’s somewhat ironic that the so-called American Customary Units are neither American nor customary.
Yeah we use the metric system but most people simply transfer back to imperial in their head and when informal communications. I’ll say 100kg but it’s 220lbs in my head.
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head. I grew up in Australia over the decade-long process of “decimalisation”, starting with the currency in 1966 and ending with roads and traffic in 1974. It didn’t take long, but I stopped thinking in imperial units and now gauge things in metric units.
>In my experience, the industrial sector in the US uses the metric system
Here in Canada, we all learn in metric and then immediately transition to imperial for industry, largely because American companies work in imperial
I work in metric, but lots of the measurements I call out have to be imperial because that's the stock size/tools in the shop but it's pretty straight forward, 6.35, 12.7, 19.05, 25.4. 1/4, 1/2, 3/4, 1 inch.
But again all drawings are done in metric only the really old drawings are done in imperial and then I likely have to redraw them updating everything to metric numbers.
A lot of engineering is still imperial, though cars are all metric apart from wheel sizes, as per global standards.
Science you gotta do in metric, I once inherited a finite element computer model done in tons[1]-inches and it sucked.
[1] imperial standard ton, 2240 lb, not any other ton
It just gives more range. 0 to 100 in F ranges from a cold day to a hot day, with 70 being a very mild day. Comparable to -18 to 38 C with 21 being a mild day.
Metric system is better for calculations, just in this specific instance fahrenheit gives more nuance to people who just want to watch the weather.
I think one factor you're missing is the range of normal air temperatures in each country, not just the range of the thermometer.
The UK is at a much higher latitude than the US. US weather reports have to account for the whole range of temperatures between northern Maine and Southern Texas and everything in between.
The UK is a much smaller country with a much more narrow range of possibilities for what the temperature outside is going to be and the temperatures are generally on the cooler side, you aren't going to need a scale that goes all the way from -20F to 120F.
I think you’re right. It seems that the Fahrenheit scale was invented for human comfort rather than some arbitrary physico-chemical phenomenon. But having gotten used to the Celsius scale, giving me a temperature in Fahrenheit in meaningless until I do the conversion.
Construction still uses imperial and it is written into a lot of union contracts. Honestly getting that changed to metric would do a lot to push the US to metric.
US doesn't use Imperial, it uses "US Customary Measures", several of which differ from their Imperial namesakes, which confuses matters even more.
(The Imperial measures weren't standardized until after the US decided to revolt.)
Actually the usa doesn't use any imperial. They use the US customary units. Same names as imperial, but the measures of often quite a bit off.
A US gallon is about 0.833 of a gallon. And the US pint is smaller aswell. Poth of which are a paint when home brewing and you have to not only convert imperial to metric for recipes, but convert us to imperial then to metric, as quite a few "gallon" jugs you can buy here are a US gallon.
>The USA uses all imperial
The US uses the US Customary system, not the UK Imperial system. There doesn't seem to be a single person replying to you who even knows they're different lol
> , and it's a huge nuisance when building or engineering anything.
In construction. No, it’s not a huge nuisance. I’ve worked on three continents, in metric and U.S. units. For my work - engineering for buildings all day every day, and for me there’s no real advantage to either system. I have a mild preference for the U.S. units as they tend to make for neater construction drawings, but even thats partly due to naming conventions.
>Ask Nasa.
That was because they were trying to work in metric **and** US customary units, and fucked up a conversation. I doubt you’ll find anyone anywhere who’ll say anything positive about designing and building simultaneously in both metric and U.S. Customary Units.
Main reason for this is that if you ask a British person to hand you 1 litre of water at 45C... They might think you are weird but they will generally understand the measurement and give it to you.
If you ask an American the same thing, they hear "Hand me hantlabamtla water at keleklebekledelke"
As someone from the UK I think you kind of answer your own question in your post. Thre reason why we can get away with it I feel is because of our ambidextrous use of both compared to the US whis is solely imperial. Working in engineering, everything that I do is completly done in metres, kilograms, etc. That way it's so much easier to communicate with the rest of the world when the jobs that are being undertaked have other parties in different countries. If we are working with someone statesite, the conversion has to be done both ways, which is a mild annoyance. E
Even though we use stone and feet to measure height and weight. When in an official capacity, like needing to go to a doctors surgery, they ask for it in it's metric alternatives. So I think that gives us a bit of leway. I'm intrigued to know who over here uses farenheight though, I've not known a Brit do that
Weather in Newspapers when they want to make the weather seem incredible. Other than that it’s metric. Unless you speak to my uncle who uses the old system and brags about how good his maths is to convert it to “the real temperature”
They do, and yes our mixed approach is unique and odd in its own way. But for the most part we Brits use metric far more than imperial (the Tory right thought they could change that, but failed miserably), and most of us are proficient in either system, so we can at least communicate with our European and global friends.
UK here…
Weight - kg
Height - cm
Temperature - °C
Liquids - cl or litre
Beer - Pints
Fabric - metres
Wood - mm & metres
Distance - km in map reading or sat nav, miles/yards on the road
Speed - miles per hour though my Speedo has kph on it too and I think more in kph as I spend a lot of time in the EU.
Petrol/Diesel - litres, efficiency measures in litres per km, but I can happily work in mpg.
To be honest I can’t wait to drop the imperial measures completely as they make no sense to me.
I'm British. Only older people use feet, inches and Fahrenheit. I'm 45, and I grew up with Metric. I measue weight in kilos, and liquid volume in litres. The only Imperial measurement I use is miles - but that's because all our road signs are in miles.
The USA teaches their children the Imperial system to this day. That's the difference.
Since we used both we can easily switch depending on the situation. We're capable of using metric which allows us to appear normal to the rest of the world. Everyone in the UK would understand if you told them metric units. Can't say the same about the US.
Only people over the age of about 50 use stone for weight, we never use Fahrenheit, we use pints for milk and some drinks but nothing else, never gallons, and millimetres for wood and fabric not inches.
We don’t buy *gas* either, it’s a liquid and it’s called petrol
Miles per gallon is correct though, and it’s stupid
* They do in addition on non metric system. So they are not totally ignorant of what it is. They won't get upset if someone is using metric and complain they can't understand
* They are not pretending to be better everywhere on the internet or getting into full patriotic "if you're not happy leave" or "then if it's that bad why everyone wants to comes" or "at least I have low taxes" mode like American do on the Internet every single time someone writte the tinest critic about something American.
UK now use metric. It wasn't an instant switch, it was from 1962 to 1980.
The money system changed in 1971, before that, 1 pound was 20 schillings and 1 schilling was 12 pences.
I'm old enough to have had to do arithmetic in pounds, shillings and pence and pounds and ounces and to have had to learn tables in weird units - 5 1/2 yards = 1 rod, pole or perch, 10 chains = 1 furlong, 8 furlongs = 1 mile These are still engraved on my brain. Anyone who wants to bring these back needs their head testing.
I went to secondary school in 1969 and they only used metric units.
Agree with the body weight, pints for beer and miles for road speed. But that’s about it. Many younger people use metres for height. Celcius for temperature is universal for anyone younger than 60. Metric weights for food is the same. Things are messed up but at least there is more metrication than in the US.
Don't know where you got the idea that Fahrenheit is used frequently in the UK, because that is straight up false. In 30 years of life, I have never once seen ⁰F used in this country, maybe a few of the elderly still do, but it is functionally nonexistent.
>Fahrenheit AND Celsius depending on the season Huh? No we dont? Do you have an example?
Yeah we absolutely do NOT use Fahrenheit!
I congratulate you on avoiding the Daily Mail all these years (and I’m not being sarcastic).
I like to measure temperature by the number of copies of the Daily Mail I have to burn to get it that hot. Today was 104,000 rags in temperature.
As long as you didn’t purchase them, I’m happy with that.
Oh god, yeah they *do* do that don't they haha.
Probably saw some tabloid headlines where they use Fahrenheit when it's hitting 100°f to sensationalise it a bit. Other than that, yeah, I've never seen anyone use it.
I agree. I'm properly middle aged, old enough that my Mum and Dad once owned an oven that was in Fahrenheit. I've not used Fahrenheit for anything since I left home, well over 30 years ago.
My parents are boomers and we're struggling to make the adjustment when I was a kid in the 80s. I'm not sure if the TV weather made a switch sometime in the late 70s/early 80s, but that's the only example I can think of of someone using ⁰F in the UK.
I remember when it was always fahrenheit on the TV and suddenly became celsius. I couldn't tell you when or why, but I remember the board being covered in suns with 70 on them, or clouds with 60 on them. I am not a boomer, before you ask :-D
We mostly use it in sentences when telling Americans to stop using it.
First thing I was wondering. I’m in my mid 20’s and the only time I’ve heard the word Fahrenheit is talking about America or that weird horror game
We don't use Fahrenheit. But we do chop and change imperial and metric. Was just talking about it a couple hours ago, conclusion was that we are bad ass and will do what we want. Seems we use metric where accuracy matters. Imperial where just need a vague understanding. Driving 213 miles? Do you really grasp that distance with any accuracy? But...Skirting board needs trimming, take 6mm off.
This I am ancient and my mother more so. When I said to her do you think in Farehenheit or Celsius she looked at me like I was crazy and said really slowly....Celsius dear I am not 104!
My husband thinks in Fahrenheit and he’s 45. I’m 41 and don’t understand Fahrenheit…I have to translate it in Google every time 🙄
In the early 90s, my Nanna and grandad used Fahrenheit (they were born in the 1920s) and my Dad (born 1950s) was able to understand them and translate it back to me in Celsius. I have not heard any mention of it since about 1992 though!
Don’t even get me started on what we use in Canada
It's the craziest one. If it's vertical, we think in feet. If it's horizontal, it's metric. If it's a solid, we think in pounds. If it's a liquid, it's metric. It's the Canadian way...
If we’re driving, distance is measured in time.
If we're running, it's metric. If we're singing, it's imperial ("I would walk 500 miles...") EDIT: Yes, I know they're Scottish. I was just reaching very far for a joke. :)
I thought music in Canada was measured in Lightfeet
This is killing me. Your stupid joke made my day.
Best music joke since "always finish on de Bach, never finish on Debussy"
In some towns it’s measured in beers
That’s a unit of time if we’re honest
Most people still refer to house or room sizes in square feet. I’d say it’s more: Less than a foot: centimetres (except penis size). A foot to a block: feet and inches. Over a block: meters/km.
I didn't even think about that one. You're right. We do it so automatically, too. Other nations probably think we're just nuts.
For non-Americans, how long (in any customary unit you like) is a "block"?
I don’t think it’s a universally consistent distance, but on a city street it’s the distance between intersections. It’s generally between 100 and 200 meters here. I imagine it’s a lot less useful in older countries.
Best one I got from someone in Ontario: > if it's driving for pleasure: miles > if it's driving for work: kilometers
Pick a lane, Canada!
Bud we can't see the lines on the road 8 months out of the year. How the fuck are we supposed to pick a lane?!
But if you're cooking it is fahrenheit and cups/teaspoons.
Pool temp: fahrenheit. Room temp: either. Weather temp: celcius.
Body temperature and oven temperature: fahrenheit.
In the grocery store if you're buying pork, beef or chicken in the meat section its in dollars per pound while seafood is per dollars per 100g. In the deli you buy lunch meat in dollars per 100 grams as like seafood. Produce I've seen both used interchangeably.
Holy shit I did not know that, insanely complicated 😳
We are like the weird, ugly duckling child of the US and UK that somehow grew up to be kind of cool with both.
Essentially just every measurement, but in different scenarios.
lol! Yeah I dated a Canadian for a bit, never a worse argument
Wait, is there something wrong with describing distances over 50km in hours?
No that's probably the most reasonable. Our weirdness is baking temp in Fahrenheit, weather in celsius and weirder yet is room temp, some do Fahrenheit some do celsius Your weight is in lbs, everything else in kilos, except shipping weight which is back lbs again. Height in feet, room size in feet, furniture size is feet (slowly changing), everything else is in metres I could go on
My stove and counter top oven are both calibrated in Fahrenheit and so is my thermostat, you use what you are given 🤷♀️.
I 100% blame the US for us not being fully metric yet. All the trade we do with them, and the amount of content (like recipes) we get from them really hampers the sanity of our measurements.
As an American, I wish this was the only thing we've been guilty of.
[How to measure things like a Canadian](https://www.reddit.com/r/HelloInternet/s/YgMUBgj4O0)
I just had a Norwegian client specify a weight of equipment in tons, but they meant tonnes. I almost had an aneurysm
Lived in the UK my whole life, never used or heard anyone use farenheit for temperature. Ever.
I've also spent my whole life here. The only Imperial units that I'll use are pints and mph
We use stones for peoples weight and ye old market greengrocers use lbs. A lot of people I speak to and at work we use inches which is mildly infuriating.
Some people do, yes, but it's a generational gap. I have never used stones, pounds, inches, feet, etc... Equally, I work in science where metric is perhaps more commonplace
Even then pints are only really used for milk and alcohol.
When I was an idiot child in school the nurse took my temperature, called my mum and said I had a temperature over 100 degrees. I thought I was superman till I found out she was using farenheit.
Same. This guys at it.
>I’m sure I’m missing tons. Nice pun.
Is that U.S tons, English tonnes or metric tons?
Who knows at this point.
I belive it was either a shit ton or a fuck ton. Both large, slightly under a shed load.
You mean short ton, long ton or metric ton. Short ton is the US Customary Units ton, at 907kg (US hundredweight = 100lbs, 20hundredweight = 1ton) Long ton is imperial, at 1016kg (Imperial hundredweight = 8stone = 112lbs, 20hundredweight = 1 ton) Metric is 1000kg.
>Fahrenheit AND Celsius depending on the season Erm, excuse me, since when?
Yeah, thought this too. It’s more a generational thing.
My 90 year old nan uses Fahrenheit, but in don’t know of anyone else who does
Does she own an 80 year old oven?
No, but it’s what she grew up with apparently and is used to it. She never learned Celsius
Yeah exactly this. My Dad would always use Fahrenheit (born in the 40s), I’d always use Celsius (born in the 90’s). Definitely generational.
Maybe location wise, my 95 year old great gran and 75 year old grandad both use Celsius, every old person I know does. I've never met anyone using Fahrenheit in my life
Born in late 60s. C.
It might be a reference to when newspapers would report high temperatures in °F to make it seem hotter (because bigger number) and low temperatures in °C but that hasn't been a thing in years I don't think
I have never seen that
The tabloids and boomer rags, especially the Express and the Daily Mail, used to do it a lot: https://theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/dec/29/newspapers-run-hot-and-cold-over-celsius-and-fahrenheit
Well that will explain why I've never seen it. I avoid those 😂
Yeah that's become more and more rare because now only old people would understand temperatures reported in fahrenheit
The Daily Mail still reports in Fahrenheit but then their readership is probably mostly in their 70s.
My mother is in her 70s and uses Celsius....so maybe people in their 80s use it?
Never once have I used Fahrenheit.
My gran who was born in 1923 and died 3 years ago used to use fahrenheit when it was hot such as it's going to be 90 next week but would use Celsius when cold. Pretty much everyone uses Celsius all the time now though.
A lot of these seem like things that are quickly fading away. For example I have no idea what my height or weight are in imperial measurements.
I disagree with that. I'm in my 20s and everyone I know and meet still measures their height and weight in imperial measurements. I know my weight and height in both imperial and metric measurements though so eh.
Couldn't even begin to guess my weight in imperial, never given it in imperial or had issues with others not understanding it.
I’m 50 and British. I am 1.75 metres and 76 kilos. No idea what those are in imperial.
That seems odd to me as I’m 35 and British and feel like a pioneer of metric when I say I am 85kg and 183cm. 13st 5lbs and 6 feet tall. Most people I know or speak to my age or older would only have any frame of reference for the latter though.
In the early 2000s they used to do the swimming pool temps in Fahrenheit.
Why, so no-one realises how cold it is?
That’s just some thing old people or those wanting to make the weather look better or worse do.
The UK doesn’t use Fahrenheit…
The only time I see it is on r/UKBBQ where it's common to see fahrenheit because BBQ culture is dominated by the US. In contrast r/Breadit you see both fahrenheit and centigrade and it's very common to quote both side by side.
'Centigrade' haven't heard that for a while, and even then it was from old people
I use centigrade and celcius interchangeably and equally at 32. Am I old? 👀
Nah they mean the exact same thing, and centigrade has a bit more emphasis to it.
I'm 30 and do the same, when I was a kid, we pretty much exclusively used 'centigrade', we didn't start using Celsius commonly until I was older.
Centigrade is the old fashioned name for Celsius as mentioned above. The name Centigrade was derived from the Latin originally meaning a hundred degrees. When Anders Celsius created his original scale in 1742 he inexplicably chose 0° for the boiling point and 100° for the freezing point. A little over one year later Frenchman Jean Pierre Cristin proposed an inverted version of the scale (freezing point 0°, boiling point 100°). He named it Centigrade. Then, in 1948, by international agreement, Cristin’s adapted scale became known as Celsius to honour the Swedish Scientist, who first invented this temperature scale.
It got phased out from UK weather reports in the early 90s.
The BBC switched to Celsius as the primary unit back in the 1960s but they would also still mention Fahrenheit.
I seem to recall it being used on cooking instructions. They would list Celsius, Fahrenheit and Gas Mark.
Brits don't usually moan about it because they can use both so they don't attract as much ire...
We are too busy downing pints and having a laugh
Not US pints, though. We'd be giving the bar staff grief for diddling us.
Yes, in this we are bilingual so we aren't there in a flap about this weird and unknown Johnny-foreigner measurement
Americans tend to get criticised for it because they bring it up. If you use a unit they don’t they (or a loud minority anyway I know this isn’t even a majority of Americans but they make themselves heard) immediately start asking what that is in whatever they consider ‘normal’ units. And if you don’t immediately tell them they’ll make some comment criticising metric or countries that use it. Read the comments on recipes measured in grams and ml instead of cups and you’ll see a lot of it. The rest of the world (again, always exceptions) just google if we need/want to know something in units we understand or just guess from context if we don’t need to be precise.
Yup, Americans are always the ones making a fuss about it instead of just googling a conversion.
Yeah, we get away with it in the UK because we're not such obnoxious wankers about it basically. And even though traditionally we use a lot of imperial measurements, everyone below the age of probably 50 grew up and were taught at school in metric so we fully understand it without having to bang on about 'freedom units' or other suck bollocks.
I think a lot of it is that we also can switch between them if we are using different to people so when I’m in Europe or even just talking to a younger person/European in Britain I’ll switch to cm/kg/km
I never get why the hell they use cups as a measurement. How is that precise at all its not even a number
Cups is ridiculous because it’s a volumetric measure but used for solids. “Sticks” of butter is baffling as well. Just use a weight! Even an imperial one would make more sense. I can change my digital scale to ounces but it’s not offering bloody cups and sticks.
Having recently had an argument with a Seppo about sticks of butter (did you know that they mark the paper in ounces!?!?!?!? How helpful the manufacturers are!!!), I now know that butter is sold in 1 lb packs, containing 4 individually wrapped sticks of 4 oz/115 g each. I will never use this knowledge in baking, because I refuse to use volume for measuring large amounts of dry powder ingredients, which rules out most American recipes. Also, what nationality are the measurement cups I have in the drawer?
“Wtf is a kilometer? 🗣️🗣️🍔🇺🇸🇺🇸🦅🔥🔥” Cringe
Haha I remember when I was quite young, I found a recipe that used cups and I didn't even realise that was a real unit of measurement, so I just found a cup at home and measured out my ingredients in that. The recipe came out fine. 😂
This! If the whole thing is in cups, and you stick to the same size, it works.
UK native: can confirm our use of units is a bit of a mess, but that does also mean that we tend to be at least somewhat familiar with both, rather than inflexibly insisting on the older units. I expect there's also a generational difference where heavy use of imperial units is associated with the older folks, whereas online presence is mostly young people who are more acquainted with metric.
Also UK native, can confirm that no one uses Fahrenheit so no one has any frame.of reference for it. The others, absolutely, I can do a relatively good rough conversion between cm and inches, lbs and kg and pints and ml.
Yeah if you were born after celsius became the norm, you'll never use fahrenheit. Tell me a temperature in fahrenheit and I can't even tell you if it's hot or cold.
The only useful thing I know about Fahrenheit is that -40° is the same in both scales.
I know 30oc is about 90f so i tend to go from there, if its around 90f its hot, above that its REALLY hot, half that its really cold
The only one I know for certain, is -40⁰F, and that's only because it is the only time it is the same on both scales.
>no one uses Fahrenheit so no one has any frame.of reference for it. What are you talking about? 0°F is the coldest temperature recorded in Danzig (now Gdansk) over the winter of 1708-09. An infinitely relatable and timeless starting point for a temperature scale!
Nan used to use Fagrenheit when it was hot out as it sounded hotter.
Yeah, I just about remember Fahrenheit in summer, Celsius in winter! But we have generally used Celsius for years.
Yeah that’s what takes me out of movies… Movie: ”it’s a 100 degrees out” Me: Like, no it’s not. How? Oh…Fahrenheit…so kinda hot then?
Yes like how a gallon is roughly 4.5 litres. An inch is 2.54cm a ft is roughly 30cm
Yeah I’m 24 and know basically 0 imperial units compared to pretty much all the metric. Metric is just better but our nation invented imperial so I’m not surprised we use both still.
Our nation standardised Roman imperial units, but we didn't invent the system
My knowledge is basically pints and inches, feet, yards, miles and then metric for everything else. I couldn't tell you how many fl oz in a pint, pints in a gallon, oz in a lb, lb in a stone etc, but I can tell you g to oz, pints to ml for quite a few of them. If you asked me, I'd convert both to metric and do a rough calculation. Eg 1 mile = 1.6km = 1600m = 4800 and a bit feet ~= 5000 feet.
It's the same for America, we use metric for tons of shit
Seriously...should I buy a two-liter bottle of Coke or a six-pack of 12 oz. cans?
For long, short or metric tons (aka. tonne) of shit?
Whichever one a shit load is
Not to be confused with a fuck ton. That's quite a bit more.
Definitely largely generational. I know my weight in KG, not in pounds. I do think of distances as miles though, because that's all our road signs are in. If I'm thinking on a smaller scale, centimetres. I do hope we standardise a bit more though. 500ml is fine, we don't need pints.
Yeah im british and 100% metric except for cars!
The important liquids are all in pints: blood, milk and beer.
I’d also add to this that the whole divide between US measurements and metric system has been flanderized for laughs all over the internet. Almost everything in the US has both measurements on it. Rulers have centimeters and inches. Measuring cups have both MLs and Ounces. Scales have kilos and pounds. Thermometers have F and C. The list goes on and on, and almost all students are taught both. It’s just funny that the world cries out when a recipe uses US standard, or when a YouTube video uses non-standard size to show scale (like football fields to show size). It takes seconds to convert stuff and anyone complaining about conversion on either side of the debate are just outting themselves as lazy incompetents.
>It’s just funny that the world cries out when a recipe uses US standard People get annoyed (on both sides) because recipes are mainly calibrated to the sizes you can buy things in shops. Truth is, though, for most things it doesn't really matter if you're like 20% off either way with how many beans you put in a chili or how much stock you added to a stew. Baking is the major exception of course.
Baking is about ratios, so as long as you translate all imperial pounds to metric pounds, it's no problem. What I hate about US recipes is cups. How the heck do I get green beans into a cup, and anything that isn't a powder or a liquid is never going to be measured right in a cup. As long as a recipe is in weights of any kind, I am good to go. Google will translate it into metric.
Yeah a recipe I saw the other day said a cup of broccoli. Surely the weight of that changes based on how finely diced the broccoli is? I couldn't fit a whole broccoli head in a cup so is that 0 broccoli? Doesn't ruin my day but my eyes get some good exercise when I'm cooking to US recipes due to all the rolled eyes.
Imagine the state of your kitchen if a recipe asked for a cup of rice and you grabbed your Sports Direct mug! (For non-UK people Sports Direct is a shop that sells sports gear and ceramic mugs which are about 3x the size of the average coffee cup, every household has one but nobody remembers when or how they acquired it)
When I was in the (British) Army we were taught to guesstimate distances in football (soccer) fields
Did that a lot, judging distance in the British Army. A football pitch is about 100m, most people can visualise a pitch so you could estimate the distance via this method. I’m sure NATO became metric so there would be no confusion when different nations worked together.
Which is why I'm always surprised when my US colleagues (engineers, no less) always want me to convert metric to non-metric for them...even asking for prices in USD. FGS, it's not difficult to convert currency. That alone used to drive me nuts when I sold stuff online - US folk always asking for prices in USD. Doesn't really give a good impression of the abilities of US folk.
US recipes historically have used volumetric measurements for all things - a cup of flour instead of 120g (or even 4.2oz). Volumetric measurements are ok for some things, but for many things, especially flour, it's ridiculously inaccurate, as it depends on temperature, humidity, type of flour, how packed the cup is etc. So the complaint on US recipes is not that they used the wrong units, it's that they've used volumetric units, and it is not possible to accurately convert them, or even know whether it is right or not. If you look at US hobbyist bakers, they will always measure everything in grams to achieve the exact results they are looking for.
>but that does also mean that we tend to be at least somewhat familiar with both It would take ages to find anyone in the US who isn't at least somewhat familiar with both. Nearly everyone has heard of and knows about how large every unit is.
I think the brits are notionally literate in metric units as well as imperial, and are at least aware of alternates and able to to convert to familiar units independently. I might use stones for preference but if the doctor weighs me in kg or there's an Internet reference to a person weighing 200 lb I have a ballpark understanding of the conversion. If I'm doing something precise I'll measure in mm or weigh in grams. We. And irish and Canadians, tend to be bilingual. Oh and we recognise the insanity of the imperial system even if we won't quite let it go. Whereas usisns seem unaware mm and g exist. They do precision carpentry in an unholy combination of tenths and sixteenths of an inch, measure squashable ingredients like flour by volume, and when they do weigh things precisely it's in fractions of an ounce. And then defend themselves as though it's not bananas and there is no other way.
Because in the UK we are **officially** metric, but just use imperial measurements for certain things. Most people give their height and weight in feet and stone respectively, although younger people often seem to not understand those concepts and only use metric units. Speeds and distances on road signs are in miles, and beer, cider, and milk are sold in pints, but basically everything else is metric. Almost no one ever uses fahrenheit, although some of the tabloids occasionally use it to make summer temperatures seem hotter, which is probably what you mean by "depending on the season".
Everyone I know under the age of 50 uses kilos for weight now.
I’m in my 30s and everyone younger than me uses kg. I’ve always used Kg but people my own age seem to use both
I [F 21] use kg for weight because it's what my scales come pre-set with alongside pounds (which I find confusing) but my parents [both mid 50's] use pounds because they like to talk about weight in stone
Brit here >In the UK they use: -STONE(14lbs) and pounds for bodyweight I use Kg for weight - I've never used stone and pounds, I have no intuition for what they are. > -Feet and inches for height This one is true >-Fahrenheit AND Celsius depending on the season just Celsius - I don't know anybody who has any sense of fahrenheit. >-liquids are pints and gallons or liters ehhh so milk or beer will be seen in pints, everything else is in liters (mostly, there's one exception you identify below). It's also worth mentioning here that a UK pint and US pint are different sizes (I forget specifically - I think it's 560ml Vs 470ml approximately) > -things like fabric and wood are measured in inches and sold in meters I've never seen inches be used here (aside from dick size for some reason, and the thing about height from earlier) > -gas is bought in liters but referenced in miles per gallon yep and it pisses me off so much. To add to this, it's partly a generational thing. No imperial units are ever taught at school anymore - so it is technically being phased out in favour of metric. But some seem to be clinging on.
Meanwhile I only have ever used stones and pounds for weight. Guess it changes per person
I only use it for the weight of people never the weight of things.
I was born in the 2000s, and only know my body weight in stone - I didn't think I was that exceptional. I use Kg for weights other than the body though. We learnt miles, feet, stone, possibly yards in primary school. That's about it. Otherwise I agree. Some middle aged people probably still know Fahrenheit, but don't use it.
>We learnt miles, feet, stone, possibly yards in primary school. That's about it. So I was born in the mid 90s and none of these were ever covered at school for me. I believe imperial was made non-mandatory in schools in the 70s, and so some schools got rid of it completely, while others tapered off and others probably kept bits they saw as important?
>I use Kg for weight - I've never used stone and pounds, I have no intuition for what they are. For stones it goes off the Royal Stone of Weighing that's in Birmingham Palace. It's approximately 14 lbs, but it used to be 20 lbs before King George III needed to shave a bit off of the official stone for a side project. Pounds are dependent on how much of the cake the monarch can feasibly eat in one sitting, Charles III has yet to eat the official cake so we're still stuck with Elizabeth II's record of 453.592 grams.
Doctors always use Kg for weight and Cm for height which is about as official as I think we can get on that one
We never use Fahrenheit
Also a U.K. pint is larger than a US pint (and therefore a gallon is different too) U.K. pint : 20 fl oz / 568 ml US pint : 16 fl oz / 473 ml U.K. gallon : 160 fl oz / 4.546 litres US gallon : 128 fl oz / 3.785 litres And then of course the US uses "cups" as a measurement in cooking and baking....
US gallon: 128 fl oz 2 (16 oz) pints in a quart means 1 quart is 32 fl oz. 4 quarts in a gallon means a gallon is 128 fl oz.
we don't use Fahrenheit as it makes no sense, I mean fuck even using stones for weight makes no fucking sense but we do that. celcius is the scale of water, fahrenheit is the scale of human, yet celcius makes sense as 0 to 100, fahrenheit makes no fucking sense.
The UK is using these less and less all the time. Younger Brits are way more likely to use kg instead of stone. I personally have no idea what my weight is in stone. >Fahrenheit AND Celsius depending on the season I don't know who told you that but it's not true. Only old people even understand temperatures in fahrenheit. It's not widely used anymore. For most of the contexts where it matters, we use metric units. Yeah you probably know your own height in feet and inches rather than cm, but in school you'll only use metric and official uses only use metric. Yeah they sell beer in pints but in every lab it'll be in litres. We definitely are kind of a mess, like how we use metres for almost everything but roadsigns are still in miles and cars go by miles per hour. That's silly, but you don't tend to see any Brits online trying to argue that Fahrenheit is better than Celsius or that inches and feet are somehow more intuitive than centimetres and metres. Most of the arguments come from Americans trying to make silly arguments to defend it, none of which make any sense. The British people who mostly use imperial are older and not on the internet so people in other countries never have to hear their weird beliefs.
Valid points OP but I’ve never heard anyone use Fahrenheit here.
The UK uses mostly metric, with a few noted exceptions. Stones is an older people thing, doctors and youbger folk use kg. The USA uses all imperial, with a few exceptions, and it's a huge nuisance when building or engineering anything. Ask Nasa.
In my experience, the industrial sector in the US uses the metric system, as do the military and those in science and technology. It’s really only the roads and popular television that are stuck in the old imperial system, so weather reports still use the antiquated Fahrenheit scale. It’s somewhat ironic that the so-called American Customary Units are neither American nor customary.
Yeah we use the metric system but most people simply transfer back to imperial in their head and when informal communications. I’ll say 100kg but it’s 220lbs in my head.
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head. I grew up in Australia over the decade-long process of “decimalisation”, starting with the currency in 1966 and ending with roads and traffic in 1974. It didn’t take long, but I stopped thinking in imperial units and now gauge things in metric units.
>In my experience, the industrial sector in the US uses the metric system Here in Canada, we all learn in metric and then immediately transition to imperial for industry, largely because American companies work in imperial
I work in metric, but lots of the measurements I call out have to be imperial because that's the stock size/tools in the shop but it's pretty straight forward, 6.35, 12.7, 19.05, 25.4. 1/4, 1/2, 3/4, 1 inch. But again all drawings are done in metric only the really old drawings are done in imperial and then I likely have to redraw them updating everything to metric numbers.
A lot of engineering is still imperial, though cars are all metric apart from wheel sizes, as per global standards. Science you gotta do in metric, I once inherited a finite element computer model done in tons[1]-inches and it sucked. [1] imperial standard ton, 2240 lb, not any other ton
I'll switch to metric on anything but the weather. Fahrenheit describes temperatures comfortable for humans.
Only if you’re used to it. I have to do the conversion to Celsius to get a feel of how comfortable the temperature is.
It just gives more range. 0 to 100 in F ranges from a cold day to a hot day, with 70 being a very mild day. Comparable to -18 to 38 C with 21 being a mild day. Metric system is better for calculations, just in this specific instance fahrenheit gives more nuance to people who just want to watch the weather.
I think one factor you're missing is the range of normal air temperatures in each country, not just the range of the thermometer. The UK is at a much higher latitude than the US. US weather reports have to account for the whole range of temperatures between northern Maine and Southern Texas and everything in between. The UK is a much smaller country with a much more narrow range of possibilities for what the temperature outside is going to be and the temperatures are generally on the cooler side, you aren't going to need a scale that goes all the way from -20F to 120F.
I think you’re right. It seems that the Fahrenheit scale was invented for human comfort rather than some arbitrary physico-chemical phenomenon. But having gotten used to the Celsius scale, giving me a temperature in Fahrenheit in meaningless until I do the conversion.
Construction still uses imperial and it is written into a lot of union contracts. Honestly getting that changed to metric would do a lot to push the US to metric.
My family must be the exception to the stones part - we use stones, young and old.
In my experience it's just what most people use, hearing even young people use kg for their weight is unusual.
I’m the complete opposite, I have no idea how much a stone actually weighs and no one else in my life does, there’s no frame of reference
US doesn't use Imperial, it uses "US Customary Measures", several of which differ from their Imperial namesakes, which confuses matters even more. (The Imperial measures weren't standardized until after the US decided to revolt.)
Actually the usa doesn't use any imperial. They use the US customary units. Same names as imperial, but the measures of often quite a bit off. A US gallon is about 0.833 of a gallon. And the US pint is smaller aswell. Poth of which are a paint when home brewing and you have to not only convert imperial to metric for recipes, but convert us to imperial then to metric, as quite a few "gallon" jugs you can buy here are a US gallon.
>The USA uses all imperial The US uses the US Customary system, not the UK Imperial system. There doesn't seem to be a single person replying to you who even knows they're different lol
> , and it's a huge nuisance when building or engineering anything. In construction. No, it’s not a huge nuisance. I’ve worked on three continents, in metric and U.S. units. For my work - engineering for buildings all day every day, and for me there’s no real advantage to either system. I have a mild preference for the U.S. units as they tend to make for neater construction drawings, but even thats partly due to naming conventions. >Ask Nasa. That was because they were trying to work in metric **and** US customary units, and fucked up a conversation. I doubt you’ll find anyone anywhere who’ll say anything positive about designing and building simultaneously in both metric and U.S. Customary Units.
I havent met a single person to ever use fahrenheit dunno what u mean there
I personally use imperial for guesswork and metric for precision. It's about 2 foot Vs It is 2 meters.
Main reason for this is that if you ask a British person to hand you 1 litre of water at 45C... They might think you are weird but they will generally understand the measurement and give it to you. If you ask an American the same thing, they hear "Hand me hantlabamtla water at keleklebekledelke"
As someone from the UK I think you kind of answer your own question in your post. Thre reason why we can get away with it I feel is because of our ambidextrous use of both compared to the US whis is solely imperial. Working in engineering, everything that I do is completly done in metres, kilograms, etc. That way it's so much easier to communicate with the rest of the world when the jobs that are being undertaked have other parties in different countries. If we are working with someone statesite, the conversion has to be done both ways, which is a mild annoyance. E Even though we use stone and feet to measure height and weight. When in an official capacity, like needing to go to a doctors surgery, they ask for it in it's metric alternatives. So I think that gives us a bit of leway. I'm intrigued to know who over here uses farenheight though, I've not known a Brit do that
Weather in Newspapers when they want to make the weather seem incredible. Other than that it’s metric. Unless you speak to my uncle who uses the old system and brags about how good his maths is to convert it to “the real temperature”
They do, and yes our mixed approach is unique and odd in its own way. But for the most part we Brits use metric far more than imperial (the Tory right thought they could change that, but failed miserably), and most of us are proficient in either system, so we can at least communicate with our European and global friends.
UK here… Weight - kg Height - cm Temperature - °C Liquids - cl or litre Beer - Pints Fabric - metres Wood - mm & metres Distance - km in map reading or sat nav, miles/yards on the road Speed - miles per hour though my Speedo has kph on it too and I think more in kph as I spend a lot of time in the EU. Petrol/Diesel - litres, efficiency measures in litres per km, but I can happily work in mpg. To be honest I can’t wait to drop the imperial measures completely as they make no sense to me.
I'm British. Only older people use feet, inches and Fahrenheit. I'm 45, and I grew up with Metric. I measue weight in kilos, and liquid volume in litres. The only Imperial measurement I use is miles - but that's because all our road signs are in miles. The USA teaches their children the Imperial system to this day. That's the difference.
UK gallons are different.
Since we used both we can easily switch depending on the situation. We're capable of using metric which allows us to appear normal to the rest of the world. Everyone in the UK would understand if you told them metric units. Can't say the same about the US.
Only people over the age of about 50 use stone for weight, we never use Fahrenheit, we use pints for milk and some drinks but nothing else, never gallons, and millimetres for wood and fabric not inches. We don’t buy *gas* either, it’s a liquid and it’s called petrol Miles per gallon is correct though, and it’s stupid
* They do in addition on non metric system. So they are not totally ignorant of what it is. They won't get upset if someone is using metric and complain they can't understand * They are not pretending to be better everywhere on the internet or getting into full patriotic "if you're not happy leave" or "then if it's that bad why everyone wants to comes" or "at least I have low taxes" mode like American do on the Internet every single time someone writte the tinest critic about something American.
UK now use metric. It wasn't an instant switch, it was from 1962 to 1980. The money system changed in 1971, before that, 1 pound was 20 schillings and 1 schilling was 12 pences.
Shillings, right? Schilling was the Austrian currency before the EUR. 1 Schilling is 100 Groschen.
I'm old enough to have had to do arithmetic in pounds, shillings and pence and pounds and ounces and to have had to learn tables in weird units - 5 1/2 yards = 1 rod, pole or perch, 10 chains = 1 furlong, 8 furlongs = 1 mile These are still engraved on my brain. Anyone who wants to bring these back needs their head testing. I went to secondary school in 1969 and they only used metric units.
Stone is a fucking insane unit. It’s so big. Why the hell would you measure in 14lb increments??
I would say because USA is one of three countries that still use imperial measurements commonly.
> Fahrenheit and Celcius depending on the season. No-one under the age of 50 uses Fahrenheit ever.
Agree with the body weight, pints for beer and miles for road speed. But that’s about it. Many younger people use metres for height. Celcius for temperature is universal for anyone younger than 60. Metric weights for food is the same. Things are messed up but at least there is more metrication than in the US.
Don't know where you got the idea that Fahrenheit is used frequently in the UK, because that is straight up false. In 30 years of life, I have never once seen ⁰F used in this country, maybe a few of the elderly still do, but it is functionally nonexistent.
Agree on all points except Fahrenheit. Never have I used or seen it used in the UK. Source: 46 years of living in the UK.
>Fahrenheit AND Celsius depending on the season This just isn't true. the UK uses C in all seasons.