Food & cooking · Meal prep
Dried beans to cooked beans calculator.
Enter dry weight to see the cooked weight, or the cooked weight you want to see the dry weight to buy. Six common beans and lentils.
Inputs
Dry and cooked weight
Enter your numbers.
How much cooked chickpeas do dried chickpeas make?
Dried beans and lentils soak up water as they cook, so they weigh more cooked than dry. This tool uses the water content that USDA FoodData Central lists for each dry bean and for the same bean boiled without salt, and assumes the dry solids stay in the pot. Chickpeas come out at about 2.3 g cooked per gram dry, lentils at about 3.0.
Worked example. 500 g of dry chickpeas gives about 1,160 g of cooked chickpeas. To end up with 1,000 g of cooked black beans you start with about 385 g dry.
Soak time, how old the beans are and how long you simmer all move the real weight, so treat the figure as a planning estimate and type your own ratio after weighing one batch.
Frequently asked questions
How much cooked chickpeas does 1 cup of dried make?
This tool works by weight, not cups, because a cup of dry or cooked beans weighs different amounts depending on how it is filled. 500 g of dry chickpeas gives about 1,160 g cooked.
How many grams of dry beans do I need for 1,000 g of cooked beans?
About 385 g of black beans, 431 g of chickpeas or 331 g of lentils, from the USDA water contents.
Do I need to soak beans first for this to work?
The USDA cooked entries are boiled beans. Soaking and simmering times differ, so your result will vary a little. Use the ratio box for your own method.
Is this the same as canned beans?
No. Canned beans are cooked and packed in liquid, so a can has a drained weight printed on it. This tool is for dry beans you cook yourself.
Why do beans weigh different amounts cooked?
Each bean has a different starting water content and absorbs a different amount while cooking, which is why the ratio ranges from about 2.3 to 3.0.
Sources
Retrieved
- USDA FoodData Central, SR Legacy (April 2018 CSV download): water content of the dry and cooked entries
- Health Canada: Nutrition labelling, table of reference amounts for food (published 2024-10-18)
Method: cooked weight per gram dry = (100 minus water in dry food) divided by (100 minus water in cooked food), using SR Legacy entries (lentils FDC 172420 and 172421, chickpeas 173756 and 173757, black beans 173734 and 173735, and the matching ids for kidney, navy and pinto beans). These are estimates from USDA water contents. Real results move with the amount of water you cook with and the pot, so weigh one batch once and type your own ratio to calibrate. Runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you type is sent or stored.
Scope
An estimate for planning portions and shopping, not a measured result for your pot. Always cook meat and poultry to the safe internal temperature on a food thermometer, whatever the weight says. General cooking information, not medical or dietetic advice.