Fuel Range Remaining Calculator

Knowing exactly how far you can drive on your remaining fuel helps you plan long trips, decide whether to refuel now or later, and avoid the stressful situation of running out of fuel on the road.

The formula: Range = Remaining Fuel × Fuel Efficiency

For example:

• Remaining fuel: 20 liters
• Fuel efficiency: 12 km/L (or equivalently, 28 mpg)
• Range: 20 × 12 = 240 km

Understanding your car’s DTE (Distance to Empty): Modern cars show a “Distance to Empty” or “Range” reading on the dashboard. This estimate is calculated from your recent average fuel economy and current fuel level. It updates as you drive and is reasonably accurate under normal conditions, but can be off by 10–15% if your recent driving was unusually efficient or inefficient.

Fuel efficiency varies significantly by conditions:

The low fuel light: In most vehicles, the low fuel warning activates when approximately 10–15% of tank capacity remains:

• For a 50-liter tank: ~5–7.5 liters remaining (~60–90 km range at 12 km/L)
• For a 60-liter tank: ~6–9 liters remaining

Safety reserve: It’s good practice to calculate your range assuming only 80–85% of your apparent remaining fuel is usable.
Fuel gauges are not precise, driving on near-empty can draw sediment off the bottom of the tank into the fuel system, and it stresses the fuel pump, which on most cars sits inside the tank and relies on the surrounding fuel to keep cool. This calculator uses 85% and prints both figures, so you can see the gap you are working with.

This page or the tank range one?

This one is for the question you have at the wheel. You know roughly how much fuel is left, and you want to know how far that gets you the way you are about to drive, so it carries a driving-style adjustment: highway is 15% better than mixed, stop-start city 15% worse. It answers in the moment.

The fuel tank range calculator is for planning. Give it the tank capacity from the handbook and a gauge percentage and it works out the full-tank range, what is left now, and the mileage at which to start looking for a station, which it puts at 75% of the tank. That is the one to open before a long drive rather than during it.

Give them the same fuel and the same economy and they return the same distance. Ten US gallons at 30 mpg is 300 miles on both.