Free Fall Calculator

Our free fall calculator can find the velocity of a falling object and the height it drops from.

Impact speed29.7086 m/s106.95 km/h, 66.46 mph

Fall time3.0294 s

Fall height45 m147.64 ft

Gravity used9.80665 m/s²100% of standard gravity

Impact speed from rest29.7086 m/s√(2gh) — independent of mass

Average speed14.8543 m/shalf the impact speed when dropped from rest

Fallen after 1 s4.903 mthat second alone: 4.903 m

Fallen after 2 s19.613 mthat second alone: 14.71 m

Fallen after 3 s44.13 mthat second alone: 24.517 m

Fallen after 3.03 s45 mthat second alone: 0.87 m

Energy per kilogram at impact441.3 J/kgequal to gh plus the initial kinetic energy

The formula

v = gt, h = ½gt², v = √(2gh)

Mass does not appear

In a vacuum every object falls at the same rate, because the gravitational force is proportional to mass and so is the inertia resisting it — the two cancel exactly. The impact speed √(2gh) contains no mass term at all. This is Galileo's result, and it is why a hammer and a feather dropped together on the Moon land together.

Successive seconds of a fall from rest cover distances in the ratio 1 : 3 : 5 : 7, which is the odd numbers, and the totals go as 1 : 4 : 9 : 16 — the squares. That pattern is visible in the per-second breakdown above and is the clearest sign that distance grows with the square of time.

Air resistance is ignored here, and for a long fall that matters enormously: a human body reaches a terminal velocity of roughly 55 m/s in a matter of seconds, after which speed stops increasing no matter how far is left. Use these figures for short falls and vacuum problems, not for skydives.