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25 Gauge Steel Thickness in Inches and Millimetres

25 gauge steel sheet is 0.0209 in thick — 0.531 mm. A square foot weighs 0.88 lb (4.27 kg/m²). The gauge number indexes the MSG system, so the same number is a different thickness in another material — the comparison is below. Thicknesses are nominal, before mill tolerance.

Gauge
25 ga
Material
Sheet Steel
Inch
0.0209
mm
0.531
System
MSG

25 Gauge Steel · nominal thickness

0.0209 in

Millimetre
0.531mm
Weight
0.88lb/ft²
Weight
4.27kg/m²

Nominal thickness on the MSG system. Gauge numbers are material-specific — "25 gauge" on its own does not name a thickness.

25 Gauge Steel Sheet Thickness

25 Gauge Steel is defined by the Manufacturers' Standard Gauge (MSG), not by a measurement — the gauge number is an index into that system, which is why the same number means a different thickness in another material.

25 Gauge Steel — thickness and weight
PropertyValue
Thickness, decimal inch0.0209 in
Thickness, millimetre0.531 mm
Weight per square foot0.88 lb/ft²
Weight per square metre4.27 kg/m²
Gauge systemMSG

Nominal thickness. Mill tolerance on sheet is typically a few thousandths of an inch either way and varies with width and process; measure the stock when the fit matters.

25 Gauge Thickness in Every Other Sheet Material

Gauge 25 spans 0.0179 in to 0.0247 in depending on the material, because each material is indexed on a different gauge system. Ordering sheet by gauge without naming the material is how the wrong thickness arrives.

Thickness of 25 gauge sheet across materials
PropertyPropertyThickness
MaterialGauge systeminmm
Sheet AluminiumB&S0.01790.455
Galvanized Steelgalvanized-MSG0.02470.626
Sheet SteelMSG0.02090.531
U.S. Standard GaugeUSG0.02190.556

Steel uses the Manufacturers' Standard Gauge, galvanised adds a zinc-coating allowance to the steel thickness, aluminium and other non-ferrous sheet use the Brown & Sharpe geometric series, and U.S. Standard is the 1893 statute on a wrought-iron basis.

Gauges Either Side of 25 Gauge Steel

A higher gauge number is thinner sheet. The steps are not equal — the gauge systems are geometric, so the difference between two gauges shrinks as the sheet gets thinner.

Sheet Steel gauges adjacent to 25 gauge
PropertyThickness
Gaugeinmm
23 ga0.02690.683
24 ga0.02390.607
25 ga0.02090.531
26 ga0.01790.456
27 ga0.01640.418

Sources and Method for 25 Gauge Steel Thickness

25 Gauge Steel thicknesscomputed

15 U.S.C. 206 (Act of Mar. 3, 1893, ch. 221, 27 Stat. 746) — U.S. Standard Gauge for sheet and plate iron and steel; 15 U.S.C. 206 statutory weights; MSG (41.82 lb/ft2 per inch), galvanized zinc allowance, and Brown & Sharpe formula per docs/research/data-sourcing.md §3.7

Verified against Wikipedia Sheet metal, Standard sheet metal gauges table (CC BY-SA 4.0) — 137/137 checks passed at 0.05 mil

Computed from the standard's formulas, then checked against published tables.

Formula

Weight per square foot, sheet steel

lb/ft²  =  thickness (in) × 41.82

  0.0209 × 41.82  =  0.88 lb/ft²

41.82 lb/ft² per inch of thickness is the Manufacturers' Standard Gauge basis for steel. The U.S. Standard Gauge of 1893 uses a wrought-iron basis of 40 lb/ft² per inch, which is why the two systems differ.

Assumptions
  • Thicknesses are nominal. Mill tolerance varies with width, process and material and is not part of the gauge definition.
  • Gauge is an index into a material-specific system, not a unit. A gauge number without a material is ambiguous by construction.
  • Dataset scope: EXCLUDED: stainless steel (genuinely ambiguous convention, only one source in hand), zinc, copper, brass, steel tube wall.
Data last verified
August 1, 2026
How this data is built and checked →

How to Cite This 25 Gauge Steel Reference

Citation

ShopMath. "25 Gauge Steel Thickness in Inches and Millimetres." ShopMath, verified August 1, 2026, https://shopmath.org/gauges/steel/25

BibTeX

@misc{shopmath-gauges-steel-25,
  title        = {25 Gauge Steel Thickness in Inches and Millimetres},
  author       = {{ShopMath}},
  year         = {2026},
  howpublished = {\url{https://shopmath.org/gauges/steel/25}},
  note         = {Data verified 2026-08-01}
}

Permanent URL

https://shopmath.org/gauges/steel/25

Common Questions About 25 Gauge Steel

How thick is 25 gauge steel?

25 gauge steel is 0.0209 in thick, which is 0.531 mm. A square foot weighs 0.88 lb (4.27 kg/m²).

What is 25 gauge steel in mm?

0.531 mm. The gauge number is an index into the MSG system rather than a measurement, so it converts to a fixed thickness rather than a round metric figure.

Is 25 gauge steel thicker than 24 gauge?

No — a lower gauge number is thicker sheet. 24 gauge steel is 0.0239 in (0.607 mm) against 0.0209 in (0.531 mm) for 25 gauge steel, a difference of 0.0030 in.

Why is 25 gauge a different thickness in other materials?

Because each material is indexed on its own gauge system. At 25 gauge: Aluminium 0.0179 in (B&S), Galvanized 0.0247 in (galvanized-MSG), Steel 0.0209 in (MSG), US Standard 0.0219 in (USG). The number is a position in a series, not a thickness, so 3 other readings of "25 gauge" are all equally correct.

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