Wire Gauges

The common US wire gauges - AWG gauges

The AWG - American Wire Gauge - is used as a standard method of denoting wire diameter, measuring the diameter of the conductor (the bare wire) with the insulation removed. AWG is sometimes also known as Brown and Sharpe (B&S) Wire Gauge.

The higher the number - the thinner the wire. Typical household wiring is AWG number 12 or 14. For telephone wires there are common with AWG 22, 24, or 26.

AWG	Diameter (mm)	Diameter (in)	Square (mm²)	Resistance (ohm/1000m)
40	0.08	.	0.0050	3420
39	0.09	.	0.0064	2700
38	0.10	0.0040	0.0078	2190
37	0.11	0.0045	0.0095	1810
36	0.13	0.005	0.013	1300
35	0.14	0.0056	0.015	1120
34	0.16	0.0063	0.020	844
33	0.18	0.0071	0.026	676
32	0.20	0.008	0.031	547
30	0.25	0.01	0.049	351
28	0.33	0.013	0.08	232.0
27	0.36	0.018	0.096	178
26	0.41	0.016	0.13	137
25	0.45	0.018	0.16	108
24	0.51	0.02	0.20	87.5
22	0.64	0.025	0.33	51.7
20	0.81	0.032	0.50	34.1
18	1.02	0.04	0.82	21.9
16	1.29	0.051	1.3	13.0
14	1.63	0.064	2.0	8.54
13	1.80	0.072	2.6	6.76
12	2.05	0.081	3.3	5.4
10	2.59	0.10	5.26	3.4
8	3.25	0.13	8.30	2.2
6	4.115	0.17	13.30	1.5
4	5.189	0.20	21.15	0.8
2	6.543	0.26	33.62	0.5
1	7.348	0.29	42.41	0.4
0	8.252	0.33	53.49	0.31
00 (2/0)	9.266	0.37	67.43	0.25
000 (3/0)	10.40	0.41	85.01	0.2
0000 (4/0)	11.684	0.46	107.22	0.16

The higher the gauge number, the smaller the diameter, and the thinner the wire.

Because of less electrical resistance a thick wire will carry more current with less voltage drop than a thin wire. For a long distance it may be necessary to increase the wire diameter - reducing the gauge - to limit the voltage drop.

The common US wire gauges - AWG gauges

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