Convert polygon area unit from square meters to acres in ArcGIS Pro

Summary

In some instances, when working with polygon data for a GIS project, the unit used to calculate the area of the polygon features does not match the user’s preference. Converting the unit to the preferred unit value is useful to maintain the consistency of data as well as to suit the type of project carried out for analysis in ArcGIS Pro.

This article provides two workflows to convert the polygon area unit from square meters to acres.

Procedure

Use the Calculate Field tool

1. Open the ArcGIS Pro project.
2. In the Contents pane, right-click the polygon feature layer and select Attribute Table.
3. In the attribute table, add a new field and set the data type to Double. Refer to ArcGIS Pro: Create a field and apply a domain and default value for further instructions. In this example, the new field created is named Acres.

4. On the top ribbon, in the Fields tab, click Save.
5. In the attribute table view, right-click the field header and select Calculate Field.

6. Configure the Calculate Field dialog box.
   1. In the Calculate Field dialog box, the Input Table and Field Name (Existing or New) parameters are automatically selected.
   2. For Expression Type, click the drop-down menu and select Python 3.
   3. Under Fields, double-click the field with the square meters unit. In this example, Shape_Area is selected.
   4. Click the * operator.
   5. In the expression box, type a constant value of 0.0002471054.
   6. Click Verify to validate the expression.
   7. Click OK.

Use the Calculate Geometry tool

1. Repeat Steps 1 through 4 from the previous workflow.
2. Right-click the field header and select Calculate Geometry.

3. In the Calculate Geometry dialog box, configure the Parameters tab.
   1. For Input Features, the polygon feature layer is automatically selected.
   2. Under Geometry Attributes, select the field for Fields (Existing or New) and set Property to Area.
   3. For Area Unit, select International Acres from the drop-down menu.
   4. Click OK.

The image below shows the polygon area unit converted from square meters to acres.