Cake Pan Converter for Shapes and Batter Depth
Convert cake pan shapes and compute scale factor
Cake pan converter quick guide and cupcake planning
This cake pan converter for round, square, rectangle, loaf, and cupcake volumes translates your pan to a new shape by comparing fill volumes. Enter diameter for round or width and length for square and rectangle. Batter depth controls how full you plan to pour; many recipes bake best at roughly half to two thirds of total height.
After calculating, the summary shows current and target volumes, a recipe scale factor, and a practical estimate for time and temperature based on batter thickness. If you add a current bake time and oven temperature, the tool presents adjusted values you can use as a starting point and refine with doneness tests.
- For loaf tins, use inside top dimensions and your intended batter height.
- For cupcakes, choose the cupcake tin as the target to see liner count and fill guidance.
- Grease, line, and preheat as usual; check earlier when converting to shallower pans.
Use the liner volume to match your cases. Standard liners are around seventy to eighty milliliters or two to three fluid ounces. The calculator divides your target volume by the liner size and suggests a fill level that avoids mushrooming tops and underbaked centers.
How the pan volume and bake time estimates work
Volumes come from simple geometry. Round pans use pi times radius squared times fill height. Square and rectangle pans use width times length times fill height. Loaf tins are treated as rectangles at the fill height you provide. Cupcakes use the liner volume to estimate how many portions the batter will make with a reasonable headspace.
Bake time is influenced by thickness. The calculator derives a time factor from the ratio of target thickness to current thickness and a small adjustment for surface area. Temperature guidance nudges hotter for shallower, cooler for deeper. Always verify with a skewer or probe near the center and watch for edges that set and pull slightly from the sides.
Common cake pan conversion questions
Do I scale leavening and eggs linearly?
Use the scale factor as a starting point. If scaling up a lot, hold back a small amount of leavening and add by feel to avoid tunneling.
What if the target pan is much shallower?
Expect faster baking and consider reducing temperature by about ten degrees Celsius while checking earlier.
Can I mix shapes across layers?
Yes. Convert each layer by its own volume so each bakes evenly and stacks without doming surprises.