Sizes & Bags

Trash can liters to gallons

Divide liters by 3.785 and you have US gallons. The useful part is the second column: which liter sizes land on a real bag size, and which ones land in the gap where no bag fits properly.

By Ryder M. · Last reviewed October 10, 2026

A glass measuring jug with imperial and metric graduations

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The conversion

One US gallon is 3.785 liters, so to convert a can's liter rating to gallons, divide by 3.785. A 45-liter can is 11.9 gallons. A 50-liter can is 13.2 gallons. A 58-liter can is 15.3 gallons. A 30-liter can is 7.9 gallons. Those four cover most of the cans sold in American kitchens, because European manufacturers rate in liters and American ones rate in gallons.

The arithmetic is trivial. What is not trivial is what the answer means for the bag you have to buy, and that is why this page exists rather than a calculator.

The full chart

Liters	US gallons	Typical can	Bag that fits
10 L	2.6 gal	Slim bathroom or desk can	4-gallon liner
12 L	3.2 gal	Bathroom step can	4-gallon liner
15 L	4.0 gal	Compact recycler compartment	4-gallon liner
20 L	5.3 gal	Small kitchen or office can	8-10 gallon liner
30 L	7.9 gal	Under-counter pull-out bucket	8-10 gallon liner
36 L	9.5 gal	Brabantia Bo Touch	Awkward - 10 gal is tight, 13 is loose
40 L	10.6 gal	Compact recycling unit	13-gallon tall kitchen
45 L	11.9 gal	The common simplehuman step can	13-gallon tall kitchen
50 L	13.2 gal	Most sensor cans; the US standard	13-gallon tall kitchen - the exact match
55 L	14.5 gal	Larger step can	Awkward - over a 13-gallon bag
58 L	15.3 gal	simplehuman 58L sensor	Awkward - the 14-19 gallon gap
60 L	15.9 gal	Joseph Joseph Totem Max	Awkward - the 14-19 gallon gap
80 L	21.1 gal	XL automatic can	20-30 gallon large bag

Gallon figures are the arithmetic conversion at 3.78541 L per US gallon, rounded to one decimal. Bag recommendations assume a can with no retaining ring.

Four rows in that chart are marked awkward, and they are not a rounding problem - they are a market problem. There is no standard household bag size between 13 and 20 gallons, so every can rated 55, 58 or 60 liters is being lined with a bag cut for something smaller. The full bag ladder and where the gap is.

Going the other way: gallons to liters

Multiply gallons by 3.785. The numbers worth memorizing are the ones printed on cans and bags you will actually meet.

US gallons	Liters	Where you see it
4 gal	15.1 L	Bathroom liners
8 gal	30.3 L	Cabinet pull-out buckets
13 gal	49.2 L	The American tall kitchen standard
20 gal	75.7 L	Large utility cans
32 gal	121.1 L	Small outdoor cart
64 gal	242.3 L	Standard curbside cart
96 gal	363.4 L	Largest residential cart

Why cans are sold in liters at all

Because the brands that defined the premium end of the category are European. Brabantia is Dutch, Joseph Joseph is British, and both rate in liters because their home markets do. simplehuman is American but was built to compete with them and adopted the convention, which is why a US kitchen can carries a liter figure and an American bag carries a gallon figure, and neither was designed with the other in mind.

That mismatch is the single most common source of confusion in this category, and it is worse than a unit problem. Both numbers are nominal. A can's liter rating usually describes the volume up to the rim; a bag's gallon rating describes a loose volume class rather than a measured capacity. Converting precisely between two approximations does not get you a precise answer - it gets you a starting point you then check against the bag's flat dimensions. Why your trash bag does not fit.

Two cans that show the problem: a 45-liter can that a 13-gallon bag lines well, and a 36-liter can that falls between two bag sizes.

Best overall

simplehuman 45L Rectangular Step Can with Liner Pocket

The kitchen can that solves bag fit properly, with a pedal rated for 150,000 steps and a liner pocket that ends the hunt for the box under the sink.

$149.99 · View on Amazon

Price as of October 16, 2026. #ad How we make money

Best warranty

Brabantia Bo Touch Bin, 36 L

A touch-open bin with a ten-year guarantee and a removable inner bucket, built to sit flat against a wall.

$166.07 · View on Amazon

Price as of October 16, 2026. #ad How we make money

Other units you will run into

Quarts

Four US quarts to the gallon, so a 13-gallon can is 52 quarts and a 45-liter can is about 47.5. Quarts turn up almost exclusively on cabinet pull-out buckets, which are sold as 35-quart units. Quarts in a 13-gallon can.

Cubic feet

One cubic foot is 7.48 US gallons, so a 96-gallon cart is about 12.8 cubic feet. You will only meet this on commercial dumpster specifications, never on a household can.

No unit at all

Plenty of listings say "large" or "XL" and nothing else. In that case the only reliable numbers are the external dimensions, and the useful one is the internal height - because that, not volume, decides whether your bag reaches the bottom. Trash can dimensions by size.

Common questions

How many gallons is a 45 liter trash can?

11.9 US gallons. Divide liters by 3.785 to convert. A 45-liter can takes a standard 13-gallon tall kitchen bag comfortably, with some overhang to tuck.

How many gallons is a 50 liter trash can?

13.2 US gallons, which is why 50 liters is the size most American sensor cans are built to - it is the closest metric match to the 13-gallon bag standard.

How many gallons is a 30 liter trash can?

7.9 US gallons. An 8 to 10 gallon liner fits it; a 13-gallon bag will be loose and will hang well over the rim.

How many liters is a 13 gallon trash can?

49.2 liters. That is why cans are commonly sold at 50 liters rather than at some other round metric figure - 50 L is the nearest tidy number above the American bag standard.

What bag fits a 58 or 60 liter can?

Nothing fits properly off the shelf. At 15.3 and 15.9 gallons both land in the gap between the 13-gallon and 20-gallon bag classes, so you either use a long 13-gallon bag in a can with a retaining ring, or buy the manufacturer's own fitted liner.

Is a liter the same as a litre?

Yes - same unit, American and British spellings. Both appear on trash can listings, often on the same page, and neither tells you anything different about the can.

Sources

Every specification on this page traces to one of these, checked at the time of writing. Where a manufacturer does not publish a figure, the page says so rather than estimating it.