5,900,000 t13,000,000,000 lb
The Great Pyramid of Giza weighs about 5.9 million tonnes (roughly 13 billion lb, or 6.5 million US tons). Nobody has weighed it: the figure is an estimate built from its roughly 2.3 million limestone and granite blocks, which average a little over 2 tonnes each. Published estimates run from about 5.3 to 6 million tonnes.
| Tally of materials used5.5 million t of limestone, 500,000 t of mortar and 8,000 t of granite (John Romer) | 6,010,000 t13,200,000,000 lb |
|---|---|
| Most quoted estimateThe figure used here | 5,900,000 t13,000,000,000 lb |
| Blocks times NOVA’s average2.3 million blocks at about 2.3 t each | 5,290,000 t11,700,000,000 lb |
The pyramid has never been weighed, so every figure is a calculation. The usual one multiplies the number of blocks by an average block weight. Estimates agree on about 2.3 million blocks, but not on the average: PBS NOVA gives about 2.3 tonnes, which makes roughly 5.3 million tonnes, while Wikipedia, tallying Egyptologist John Romer’s figures, gets about 6 million tonnes of limestone, granite and mortar. For years Wikipedia gave 5.9 million tonnes, the number we use.
Tons add to the confusion. Many books say “tons” without saying which, and 5.9 million metric tonnes is about 6.5 million US tons, which is probably why that number turns up too.
The volume gives a rough check. A pyramid 230.3 m along each side of its base and 146.6 m tall holds about 2.59 million cubic metres (by our maths). Divide 5.9 million tonnes by that and you get about 2.3 tonnes per cubic metre. Solid Tura limestone, the fine casing stone, is about 2.7 t/m³ by the figures in a 2016 study of one casing block. A lower average makes sense for a core of rougher local stone with rubble and mortar in the gaps. Part of that volume is not built at all: the pyramid sits on a hillock of natural bedrock that rises almost 6 m above its base, so the stone actually laid weighs a little less than the full shape suggests.
Most of the pyramid is core blocks of local limestone, quarried just south of it on the Giza plateau and only roughly shaped. They are not uniform, which is why the average weight is quoted anywhere from about 2.3 to 2.75 tons. In a 2020 experiment, stonemason Franck Burgos and a team of four cut out one 2.5 tonne block with copies of Khufu’s copper tools in four days.
The casing blocks shrank toward the top. The bottom course is 1.49 m tall, while the top courses are only about one cubit (roughly 52 cm). A casing stone from near the summit, now in the National Museum of Scotland, weighs about 500 kg today and would have weighed about 650 kg when complete.
The heaviest stones are granite, brought from Aswan more than 900 km to the south. The largest, weighing 25 to 80 tonnes, form the ceilings of the King’s Chamber and the five “relieving chambers” stacked above it. All the granite together comes to only about 8,000 tonnes, about 0.1% of the pyramid.
When it was finished, around 2600 BC, the pyramid was covered in smooth, white Tura limestone and stood 146.6 m (481 ft) tall. In the Middle Ages, after earthquakes shook the area, most of that casing was stripped off. Accounts say it was carted away in 1356 to build in nearby Cairo. What you see today is mostly the stepped stone underneath, and only a few casing stones survive in place at the bottom.
The tip went even earlier: the capstone was already gone in Roman times, and more stones were taken from the top later. Today the pyramid is about 138.5 m tall, roughly 8 m shorter, with about 1,000 tonnes missing from the summit. The casing was far heavier. No one has measured it, but by our rough maths a layer averaging 1 m thick over its four faces (about 86,000 m²) would weigh around 200,000 tonnes, a few percent of the whole pyramid. That is smaller than the gap between the published estimates.
About 13 billion lb, or about 6.5 million US tons. That is the usual estimate of 5.9 million metric tonnes converted.
The average block weighs about 2.3 to 2.5 tonnes. Casing stones near the top weighed only about 500 to 650 kg, while the biggest granite beams over the King’s Chamber weigh up to about 80 tonnes.
About 2.3 million. If it was built over 27 years, as Burgos estimates, that works out to about 250 blocks a day.
Far heavier. The Empire State Building weighs about 331,000 tonnes, so the Great Pyramid weighs about as much as 18 of them, or about 580 Eiffel Towers.
It was 146.6 m (481 ft) tall when finished and is about 138.5 m (454 ft) today, after losing its top and casing. It was the tallest structure built by humans for more than 3,700 years.
Last checked October 3, 2026.
