Aquarium Glass Thickness Calculator

Our aquarium glass thickness calculator helps you understand key metrics associated with your aquarium. This glass thickness calculator helps you determine how thick your aquarium glass is. It also has an aquarium glass thickness chart that indicates your aquarium volume, surface area, glass weight, water weight, and total aquarium weight. These are key figures for all aquarium enthusiasts! Try out our calculator for instant results!

Using our aquarium glass thickness calculator is as easy as one, two, three. Add your aquarium length, width, and height into our calculator input fields, and voila! Our tool will instantly calculate your glass thickness. You can also convert your glass thickness results to many additional units of length measurement:

• Millimeters (mm);
• Centimeters (cm);
• Meters (m);
• Inches (in); and
• Feet (ft).

You can seamlessly perform additional conversions of length, weight, and volume, such as fluid ounces to liters. Our calculator uses the following density of glass and density of water to find their respective weights:

• Glass density of 2500 kg/m³ (156 lb/cu ft); and

• Water density of 998 kg/m³ (62.3 lb/cu ft).

You can view and change these values in the Glass and water density section of the calculator (press the heading to open/close sections of the calculator). You can also calculate the bottom and side glass deflections in the Glass deflection results section. This is the amount that glass panels bend when subjected to water.

This glass thickness calculator uses a safety factor of 3.8. Glass strengths differ between tanks, which is why selecting an adequate safety factor is crucial. 3.8 is the default safety factor for most aquariums because it minimizes the risk of your glass breaking. Now, if you're interested in expanding your knowledge about the concept of safety factors, you will have a blast with our factor of safety calculator!

We used two separate thickness equations for this glass thickness calculator because the glass on the bottom needs to be thicker so it can withstand the volume of water within an aquarium. We based our calculator on the calculations we found on Aquarium World. For the rest of the formulae in our tank glass thickness calculator, look below:

Volume formula:

volume = l × w × h

where:

• l — Length;
• w — Width; and
• h — Height.

Calculating the surface area of your tank is also pretty simple.

Surface area formula:

surface area = 2 × (l + w) × h + l × w

Weight formulae:

water weight = volume × water density

glass weight = glass volume × glass density

where:

glass volume = 2 × (l + w) × h × s + l × w × b

and:

• s — Side/front glass panels thickness; and
• b — Bottom panel thickness.

You can have lots of fun playing with these formulas, regardless of whether you want to examine them in-depth or just skim the surface! Once you're done experimenting, see if your results are correct using our calculator.

At this point, you are probably wondering just how thick is aquarium glass supposed to be? The answer is not set in stone. The required aquarium thickness can vary based on several factors, such as length, width, and height. This is where our fantastic calculator comes in handy! It seamlessly uses those variables and a built-in aquarium glass thickness chart to calculate the front and side glass thickness and the bottom glass thickness. It also uses them to calculate many additional properties such as glass weight, water weight, glass thickness, and total aquarium weight.

For example, if your tank's:

• length = 24 inches;
• width = 10 inches; and
• height = 16 inches

and you assume a safety factor of 3.8, our calculator would tell you your front/side glass thickness needs to equal 0.23 inches and that your bottom glass thickness needs to equal 0.35 inches.

On the other hand, if your aquarium is:

• length = 20 inches;
• width = 10 inches; and
• height = 23 inches.

Our glass thickness calculator would instead let you know that your front/side glass thickness needs to be equal 0.29 inches and that your bottom glass thickness needs to be equal 0.59 inches. Ready to test out what you learned? Then have fun:

1. Using our aquarium tank glass thickness calculator.
2. Determining how thick your aquarium glass is.