Plate Weights

Plate Calculator

Here is a calculator for different combinations of plates. Include the weight of collars if necessary.

Single Plate:
Double Plate:

Plate Properties

Plates vary in different ways besides weight:

• Bar. Olympic bars have thicker grips as well as ends, and thus can bear more weight than "Standard" bars. The ends rotate on Olympic bars and thus facilitate certain lifts.
  • Olympic bar. 50 mm = 1.97". IWF standard is +/- 1 mm so 2" = 50.8 mm qualifies.
  • "Standard" bar. 1" = 2.54 mm. Probably max at around 300# = 136 Kg.
• Composition:
  • Metal
  • Rubber coated. Noise reduction.
  • Rubber rimmed. Noise reduction. Some drop safety.
  • Bumper plates. Noise reduction. Plates have the same outer diameter (450 mm = 17.71" or around 0.1" more than 17 5/8". Any other diameter is foolish.) regardless of weight. The standard outer diameter assures starting consistency in many lifts. The large amounts of rubber allow the barbell to be dropped with decent safety.
• Brand: See Links.
• Other:
  • Color
  • Holes or ridges. Eases carrying.
  • Trainer bumper plates. Low weight plates for practicing form. These are not designed to be dropped.

In the US, plates for barbells and dumbbells come six common weights:

Outside of the US, standardized plates come in these weights:

Here are properties of common barbell bars. The EZ Curl bars are not standardized across manufacturers.

The common spring collars are usually considered to have no weight, but some collars are purposely heavy and should be accounted for.

Plate Combination Table

If you had a pair of plates at each of the six common US weights, then they could be combined in 2*2*2*2*2*2 = 2^6 = 64 different ways on a balanced barbell. Some of those combinations would add up to the same weight (EG: A pair of 25# plates and a pair of 10# plates would weigh 70#, which is equal to a pair of 35# plates). If all six pairs of plates were put on a barbell, you would get 245# in plates. The funny thing is that the six pairs of plates can be combined to form every number divisible by 5 from 0# (none of the plates) to 245# (all of the plates), except for 40#, 45#, 200#, and 205#.

This is why the basic 255# set of plates comes with 2 pairs of 5# plates and 1 pair of each of the other plates. The extra 5# plates make it possible to form the 40#, 45#, 200#, and 205# combinations. Furthermore, with the extra 5# plates, the 250# and 255# combinations are possible. The extra 5# plates actually enable 2*3*2*2*2*2 = 3*2^5 = 96 combinations on a balanced barbell, but most (26) of the "new" combinations add up to amounts that could be formed without the extra 5# plates.

A similar table could be made for the typical 630# set (4*2.5#, 6*5#, 6*10#, 4*25#, 2*35#, and 8*45#) and the typical 1,260# set (8*2.5#, 12*5#, 12*10#, 8*25#, 4*35#, and 16*45#).

Page Modified: (Hand noted: 2008-04-28 15:09:50Z) (Auto noted: 2010-03-10 14:14:56Z)