4 Cups of Rice in Grams

Four cups of raw white rice weigh 740 grams

The whole conversion is one multiplication: cups x grams per cup = grams. For raw long-grain white rice that is 4 x 185 = 740 g. The 185 g cup is the household measure in USDA FoodData Central record 168877, the SR Legacy entry for rice, white, long-grain, regular, raw, enriched (dataset revised April 2019). That record also lists 365 kcal and 79.95 g of carbohydrate per 100 g, which is where the calorie figures later on this page come from.

In the units a US kitchen uses, 740 g is 740 / 28.3495 = 26.10 oz and 740 / 453.592 = 1.63 lb. By volume, four cups is 4 x 236.588 = 946.4 mL, so the bulk density of the dry grain works out to 740 / 946.4 = 0.78 g per mL, against 1.00 for water. Raw rice is light for its volume because the grains pile with air between them.

The same 185 divisor covers any amount. Three cups is 555 g, two cups is 370 g, half a cup is 92.5 g, and a quarter cup is 46.3 g. Running the other way, a one pound bag holds 453.6 / 185 = 2.45 cups, so a four cup batch needs about one and two thirds pounds of rice.

Raw cups and cooked cups hold different weights

Four cups of cooked white rice weighs 4 x 158 = 632 g, not 740 g, and nothing was lost in the pot. A cooked cup only holds fewer grains floating in water: record 168878 puts cooked long-grain white rice at 158 g a cup and 68.4 percent water, so the cup is mostly the water the grains absorbed. Cooked brown rice is denser at the same stage, 202 g a cup in record 169704, which makes four cups 808 g.

Every number on this page uses the USDA household measures, 185 g for a raw cup and 158 g for a cooked cup of long-grain white rice. Other tables quote 158 g to 195 g for a cooked cup, because a cup of hot rice settles as it is spooned in and a cup of chilled rice can be packed tight. The spread is real, not an error. Choose one table and stay with it for the whole recipe, or weigh the rice and skip the argument.

Short-grain rice is the outlier on the raw side. The grains are rounder and pack closer, so a level cup of sushi rice is 200 g, and four cups is 800 g even though the volume looks identical to 740 g of long-grain. If a recipe was written for sushi rice and you pour in long-grain by the cup, you are short by 60 g of grain and the pot comes out wet.

A four cup pot turns into twelve cooked cups

The USA Rice Federation cooking guide gives the yield rule: dry white rice triples in volume, so 1 cup dry makes 3 cups cooked. Four cups therefore make 12 cups, which at 158 g a cup is 1,896 g of cooked rice, or 4.18 lb of food from 1.63 lb of dry grain. Twelve cups is 2.8 L of loose rice, so reach for a 3 or 4 quart pot with a lid rather than the small saucepan.

Water follows the same chart at 2 parts liquid to 1 part rice for long-grain white, which is 8 cups, or 8 x 236.588 = 1,892.7 g. Of that water, 1,896 - 740 = 1,156 g ends up inside the grains and about 1,892.7 - 1,156 = 737 g leaves as steam. That steam is why the lid matters: an open pot loses more than the chart assumes and the bottom scorches before the centre is tender.

Twelve cooked cups is 24 half cup scoops. That is dinner for six people at two scoops each with nothing left, or four people at two scoops with a full container for the next day. Brown rice absorbs more liquid and swells further than white, so a four cup brown batch fills the same pot and then some; judge it by texture rather than by the clock, since brown needs 40 to 45 minutes against 15 to 18 for white.

2,701 calories dry, 2,465 in the cooked pot

Four cups at 185 g is 740 g, and 740 x 3.65 = 2,701 kcal with 740 x 0.7995 = 591.6 g of carbohydrate, all from record 168877. Brown rice runs slightly higher per gram at 367 kcal per 100 g, so the same 740 g is 740 x 3.67 = 2,716 kcal, with the extra coming from bran and a little fat rather than more starch.

Cook the pot and the total barely moves: 1,896 g of cooked white rice at 130 kcal per 100 g is 1,896 x 1.3 = 2,465 kcal. The 236 kcal gap between the dry and cooked totals is table rounding, not energy escaping in the steam. Steam carries water, and the calories stay with the grain.

The number that matters at the table is the serving. A half cup of cooked white rice is about 79 g, which is 79 x 1.3 = 103 kcal, and 24 of those servings come out of one four cup batch. A full cup at 158 g is 205 kcal. If you are portioning for the week, weigh 150 g portions: 1,896 / 150 = 12.6 portions, each 195 kcal.

What four cups of rice costs

At $1.00 a pound, 740 g of dry rice costs 740 / 453.592 = 1.63, so $1.63 for the batch. Spread over 12 cooked cups that is 1.63 / 12 = $0.14 a cooked cup, or about 7 cents for a half cup serving. Jasmine or basmati at $2.00 a pound doubles it to $3.26 a batch and $0.27 a cooked cup.

Bag sizes change the math more than brands do. A 5 lb bag holds 2,268 / 185 = 12.26 dry cups, which is 12.26 / 4 = 3.06 four cup batches, or 36.8 cooked cups. At $5.00 for that bag the cooked cup lands at 5 / 36.8 = $0.14, the same as the one pound price above, because the per pound cost did not change. A 10 lb sack at $9.00 works out to 9 / 73.6 = $0.12 a cooked cup.

Compare that with the $2.50 to $3.50 a restaurant charges for a side of rice and the home batch pays for itself on the first meal. The leftover half of a twelve cup pot is where the real saving sits, since reheated rice costs nothing extra beyond the energy to steam it back to temperature.

Weighing 740 grams without a scale

A dry measuring cup, scooped and leveled with the back of a knife, lands within a few grams of 185 g for long-grain white rice. Do not tap the cup on the counter or press the rice down: both compact the grain and push a cup toward 200 g, which turns four cups into 800 g and leaves the pot short of water. Scoop from the bag, level once, and stop.

Rinsing adds water weight that the scale sees and the cup does not. If you wash the rice first, drain it in a sieve for a minute and then weigh, or shake the sieve hard and accept that a rinsed cup weighs 5 to 10 g more than a dry one. That is under 2 percent on a four cup batch, which is inside the noise of most recipes.

The repeatable method takes one extra minute. Put the pot on a scale, tare it, pour until the display reads 740 g, then add water until it reads 740 + 1,893 = 2,633 g. No cup, no leveling, no rinse guesswork, and the same pot of rice every time. For four cups in a rice cooker, use the cooker's own cup: it holds 180 mL, which at 0.78 g per mL is about 141 g of dry rice, so 740 g is roughly 5.3 cooker cups.

Grams back to cups around 740

The reverse is one division by the cup weight. For raw long-grain rice the divisor is 185: 740 / 185 = 4 cups, 800 / 185 = 4.32 cups, 1,000 / 185 = 5.41 cups, and 500 / 185 = 2.70 cups. For cooked white rice the divisor is 158, so 632 g is 4 cups and 790 g is 5 cups. Using the raw divisor on a cooked weight is the most common mistake in these conversions, and it overstates the cup count by 17 percent.

The calculator above does this division for you. Leave the cups box at 4 for 740 g of raw rice, switch the menu to cooked white for 632 g, or type a weight into the grams box to read the cups back. It also prices the batch from a price per pound and shows the cooked yield, so one screen covers the whole four cup pot.