Quite often, I am asked how many cups or fluid ounces (oz) are in a pound of honey? There is a lot of confusion, most of which is self-inflicted, because the honey industry and I  have chosen to sell honey by the pound instead of a fluid ounce or other fluid measurement unit that most liquid food is sold by. Maybe it is because honey is sold as a sweetener and competes with “dry” sweeteners like beet sugar and sugarcane. Who knows how this madness started?  Since most recipes call for liquid volume and not pounds, this can get quite confusing. Anyway, I think we are stuck with this situation so here is some help visualizing these measurements and some convenient conversion tips.

First, let’s see the volume that a pound of Whitfield’s Raw Honey occupies in a typical jar.

1 lb of honey.   This is how you buy it!

Now, let’s measure 1lb of honey into a standard kitchen measuring cup so we can convert it to volumes normally used in recipes:

1Lb of honey (by weight) in a standard kitchen measuring cup


Next, let’s see how 1 lb of honey converts into fluid measurements like cups, ounces (fluid) and even milliliters (ml).

1lb of honey is approximately equal to 1.34 Cups, 10.7 Oz (fluid) or 317 ml.

The meniscus (what does meniscus mean?) obscures our reading a bit in this photo but l lb of honey equals approximately 1.34 cups or 10.7 ounces (Oz) or 317 ml.  The following table might help you with other typical honey weight to volume conversions:

I hope this helps explain this conversion.  Let me know if you have any questions.  Happy cooking/baking and mead making!


Want to substitute a honey for granulated sugar?

1 cup granulated sugar = 1/4 – 1/3 cup raw honey

Caution, you may need to reduce the moisture in the recipe by 20-30% when using honey.

Want to know how to melt your honey without wrecking it?

Check out my post titled “Don’t Wreck Your Honey.”

