If you are looking to buy a house or a piece of land, then you may have heard the phrase half an acre to describe the size of the plot.
But it can be difficult to visualize what half an acre really looks like, especially when you are not familiar with what an acre looks like.
We take a look at the exact size of half an acre and a few examples for comparison, so you get a feeling for how big half an acre is.
How Big Is Half An Acre?
An acre is the specific size of an area, and it doesn’t have a defined width or length.
A full acre is exactly 43,560 square feet (4046.86 square meters) which means that half an acre is 21,780 square feet (2023.43 square meters).
As an acre doesn’t have exact dimensions, it can be almost any shape. This is what makes it so difficult to picture.
How Long Does It Take To Walk Across Half An Acre?
The exact time it takes you to walk across half an acre depends on the length of your stride, the terrain, your height and your fitness level.
As a rule of thumb, the majority of people can cross a flat one acre field in just half a minute. This means that you should be able to walk across half an acre in around 15 to 17 seconds.
Half An Acre: Size Comparison Examples
While the phrase half an acre is often used, it can be very difficult to picture the size of half an acre, so let’s take a look at some examples to compare.
Sports Pitches
One of the easiest ways to compare the size of half an acre is to picture a football field.
A standard football field is around 57,600 square feet which is just a little over one acre.
This means that half of a football field is 28,800 square feet which would be 7,000 square feet under a traditional football pitch.
But it can also help to compare half an acre with other sports fields.
A standard basketball court is over 49 feet wide and 92 feet long. This makes a total of 4,508 square feet.
This means that you could need around 9.5 basketball courts for one acre, or alternatively, just short of 4.5 basketball courts for half an acre.
You can also use a volleyball court as a comparison which is smaller than a traditional basketball court.
A volleyball court measures 29.5 feet in width and 59 feet in length, totaling a square footage of 1,740.5 feet. You would need around 12.5 volleyball fields to fill half an acre.
Another popular size comparison is a tennis court which is just a little bit larger than a volleyball court.
The standard tennis court is always 78 feet long. Double courts are 36 feet wide, while singles are 27 feet wide.
You would need almost eight doubles tennis courts to cover half an acre, or ten singles courts.
Vehicles
Comparing half an acre to a car’s footprint can be a little tricky, as it depends on the model, make and year of your car.
On average, the majority of cars are six feet wide and 14.7 feet long. This means that the average car has a square footage of around 88.2 feet.
This means, you would need at least 247 cars to make up half an acre of size.
The comparison gets a little easier with larger vehicles, such as buses. They can also have different lengths but the majority of buses are 8.5 feet wide and 40 feet long.
This results in an overall footprint of 340 square feet which means you would need at least 64 buses for half an acre.
Swimming Pools
Swimming pools come in all shapes and sizes which makes them tricky to use in a comparison example.
Saying this, swimming pools for professional sports have to comply with certain regulations and they have to be a specific size.
Olympic swimming pools have to be 25 meters wide and 50 meters long. This covers 82 feet by 164 feet which totals a size of 13,448 square feet.
This means you would need around two standard Olympic swimming pools to fill half an acre.
Home And Backyards
If you are looking at buying a new home, then the best way to picture what half an acre looks like is by using a comparison with the average yard or home size.
All homes can have different dimensions and plot sizes but the average US home is a standard 2,400 square feet.
This measurement only includes the house itself and not any yards. This square footage would mean you need around nine average homes to cover half an acre.
The specific sizes for yards can differ a lot from state to state depending on local and state regulations.
For example, Vermont has some of the most generous yard sizes in the United States. In comparison, Nevada has the smallest lot sizes in the country.
However, looking at all the yard sizes, the average US yard size is 12,632 square feet.
This means that you can easily picture the size of half an acre by imagining two standard yards next to each other.
But this comparison does not just work with homes or yards. You can equally use a standard garage to picture how big half an acre is.
The standard garage is 20 feet deep and 18 feet wide which results in a total square footage of 360 feet.
This means you would need at least 60.5 garages to cover the size of half an acre.
Final Thoughts
Visualizing an acre and half an acre is not easy when you do not have a comparison. We hope you found our examples above useful to picture the size of half an acre.
What Size Is It started because of that passion, but I have also chosen to write about other size, weight, and value related topics that have interested me.
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