Metrication in the United Kingdom

Metrication in the United Kingdom is the gradual adoption of metric units in trade, public services, and official measurement standards alongside persistent imperial units.

Metrication Board: A British public body established in 1969 to coordinate and encourage the transition to metric measurement. It organized the national programme and promoted metric units across industries.
Weights and Measures Act 1985: A United Kingdom statute governing units of measurement and instruments used in trade. It consolidated legal measurement rules during the ongoing changeover.
Metrication in British road signs: The use of miles and miles per hour on United Kingdom road signs and speed displays despite broader metric adoption. Road distances and speeds remain a conspicuous exception to the wider shift.
Imperial units: A system of units established in Britain in 1824 and later used across the British Empire. These units remain familiar in Britain and persist alongside metric measures.
Decimal Currency Day: The United Kingdom’s changeover to a decimal currency system on 15 February 1971. Currency conversion was a prominent early example of decimalization, though separate from metric units.
Units of Measurement Regulations 1995: United Kingdom regulations specifying units authorized for particular uses, including trade and public administration. They set the permitted units behind many metric-only trading requirements.
Metrication in British schools: The teaching and use of metric units in United Kingdom schools. School instruction helped establish metric units for generations raised during the transition.
United States customary units: A system of measurement used in the United States, derived partly from English units. Its distinct standards show that shared historical roots do not make customary systems interchangeable.
British Weights and Measures Association: A British organization that campaigns for customary weights and measures and against compulsory metrication. Its opposition illustrates the organized resistance the programme encountered.
International System of Units: The internationally standardized system of measurement built around seven base units. It supplied the coherent unit system adopted for most British official and commercial uses.

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