In eastern Uttar Pradesh and the Lucknow belt, one acre is 1.6 pucca bigha of 27,225 square feet each. In western districts a bigha is commonly 6,806.25 square feet — a quarter of the size, and 6.4 to an acre. Both are called a bigha.
Uttar Pradesh has the widest internal spread of any state in India for this unit. Anywhere else, knowing the state gets you most of the way to a reliable figure. In UP it does not, and treating a UP bigha as a single number is the most expensive mistake you can make with this conversion.
Uttar Pradesh runs three bigha at once
| Convention | Square feet | Per acre | Where |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pucca bigha (20 biswa) | 27,225 | 1.6 | Eastern UP, Lucknow belt |
| Kaccha bigha | 9,075 | 4.8 | Informal use; commonly a third of the pucca |
| Western UP bigha (5 biswa) | 6,806.25 | 6.4 | Western districts |
The pucca bigha is 3,025 square yards, which is exactly 1.6 to an acre — this is the figure behind the popular national shorthand of '1 acre = 1.6 bigha'. It is correct in Varanasi, Gorakhpur, Prayagraj and Lucknow. It is badly wrong in Meerut, Muzaffarnagar or Saharanpur, where the local bigha is roughly a quarter that size.
A four-fold gap inside one state
Ten bigha in Varanasi is about 6.25 acres. Ten bigha in Meerut is about 1.56 acres. Same state, same word, four times the land.The biswa is what actually differs
The reason the two figures relate so cleanly — one is exactly four times the other, give or take — is that they are built from the same sub-unit. A biswa in this system is 1,361.25 square feet. The eastern bigha is twenty of them; the western bigha is five.
That makes the biswa a more reliable unit to transact in than the bigha, in the same way the guntha is more reliable than the vigha in Gujarat. If a seller can quote you an area in biswa, the ambiguity largely disappears: you multiply by 1,361.25 and you have square feet, regardless of which district you are in.
- 1 biswa = 1,361.25 sq ft = 151.25 sq yd
- 20 biswa = 1 pucca bigha = 27,225 sq ft
- 5 biswa = 1 western bigha = 6,806.25 sq ft
- 32 biswa = 1 acre = 43,560 sq ft
Pucca versus kaccha in UP
Layered on top of the regional split is the pucca/kaccha distinction. A kaccha bigha in UP is commonly cited as one third of the pucca — around 9,075 square feet. This is the same pattern seen in Rajasthan, where the pucca and kaccha bigha differ by over fifty per cent, though the ratio is not identical between the two states.
In practice, kaccha figures turn up in older family arrangements and informal agreements between neighbours rather than in registered documents. If an area comes to you from a family record rather than a revenue record, that is a signal to ask which measure it is stated in.
Common UP conversions
| Acres | Pucca bigha | Square feet |
|---|---|---|
| 0.5 | 0.8 | 21,780 |
| 1 | 1.6 | 43,560 |
| 2 | 3.2 | 87,120 |
| 5 | 8 | 217,800 |
| 10 | 16 | 435,600 |
For western UP, multiply the bigha count by four. For any other amount, the acre to bigha calculator has Uttar Pradesh in the dropdown, with the western and kaccha variants listed underneath the result.
Before you agree a price in UP
- Establish the district, not just the state. Ask where the land sits relative to the western/eastern divide.
- Ask whether the quoted bigha is pucca or kaccha, and get it in writing next to the number.
- Ask for the area in biswa or square feet as a cross-check. If the two do not reconcile, that is the conversation to have before money moves.
- Compare against the khatauni or khasra entry. The revenue record's area governs registration, whatever the listing says.
The verification walkthrough covers which office holds which record and what to ask for. If you want to see how UP compares with the rest of the country, the state comparison table puts all thirteen states side by side.