What are Knots in boat terms?

Question

How much does 1 knot equal to mph

Answer 1

it means how fast you are going on a boat

Answer 2

1 international knot = 1 nautical mile per hour = 1.852 kilometres per hour exactly = 1.1507794 miles per hour.

Answer 3

The other answers are correct, just wanted to recap the history of how measuring in Knots began.  In old times, a pre-measured length of rops was thrown in the water off the stern, with knots tied in rope all the way down, measured out in a certain pattern.  The faster the ship sailed, the more knots were exposed, as the water drew the rope back tighter to the water.  In contrast, if the ship was sitting still, the rope would fall straight down below the water line, exposing 0 knots above the water line.

Answer 4

A nautical mile is a unit of length used in marine and air  navigation that is equal to a minute of arc of a great circle on a sphere. One international nautical mile is equivalent to 1,852 meters or 1.151 statute miles. The Brits, finding a need to be different, measure a nautical mile as 1853.18 meters.

To convert knots to miles, multiply knots by 1.15

Answer 5

knots never equal miles per hour. Gotta add 15%.

Answer 6

and to expand  on what a "minute of arc of a great circle" means:

the distance around the Earth at the Equator, or the distance around the Earth at any longitude that passes through both the North and South Poles is a great circle ( we're doing some rounding off here folks,, so no nit picking please.) There are other great circles, but let's not go there now.

60 minutes in a degree. 360 degrees in a circle.  60  x 360 =

21, 600 nautical miles around the world.

When measured in "standard" miles it's 24, 840.   24,840 / 21,600 = 1.15

Seafarers had to come up with a "nautical" mile as the first internationally recognized standard measurement because "land" miles  varied form country to country. There were English miles, French miles, Russian miles, etc etc etc. You can see the danger in an Englishman  saying " That dangerous reef is 35 miles away" to a Spaniard if you don't know how long that mile is.

and "knots" means nautical miles per hour. Saying 'knots per hour' is an example of the Department of Redundancy Department.