Sheet Metal Gauge Converter
Gauge to mm by metal type.
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About Sheet Metal Gauge Converter
Convert sheet metal gauge to thickness in millimetres and inches — correctly for each metal. Pick steel, galvanised, stainless or aluminium, choose a gauge (or enter a thickness to find the nearest gauge), and get the exact figure, because gauge is not a universal thickness.
16 gauge is 1.52 mm in steel but only 1.29 mm in aluminium, so a generic gauge chart gives the wrong answer for the wrong metal. It is completely free with no sign-up, and it runs entirely in your browser.
Frequently asked questions
- What is 16 gauge in millimetres?
- It depends on the metal: 16 gauge is about 1.52 mm in steel, 1.61 mm in galvanised steel, 1.59 mm in stainless, and 1.29 mm in aluminium. That's exactly why you have to pick the metal first.
- Why does gauge thickness differ by metal?
- Steel, galvanised and stainless use the Manufacturers' Standard Gauge, while aluminium, brass and copper use the AWG (Brown & Sharpe) scale — two different systems that assign different thicknesses to the same gauge number.
- Is a higher gauge number thicker or thinner?
- Thinner. The gauge scale runs backwards, so 30 gauge is much thinner than 10 gauge.
- What gauge is 1 mm steel sheet?
- About 20 gauge (0.0359 in ≈ 0.91 mm is 20 ga; 1 mm is between 19 and 20 gauge). Enter the thickness in the tool to get the nearest gauge for your metal.
- Does galvanising change the thickness?
- Yes — galvanised steel is the base steel plus a zinc coating, so a galvanised sheet of a given gauge is slightly thicker than plain steel of the same gauge.