Cos 51 Degrees

Sin, Cos, Tan, Cot of an Angle
Function
Angle (°)

What is cos 51°?

Answer

cos 51° ≈
0.6293

Angle in radians: 51° = 17π/60. The point of the angle is in quadrant I, where cosine is positive.

≈ — rounded to 4 decimal places. An exact form of cos 51° in square roots exists, but it is unwieldy — nested radicals.

P(cos 51°, sin 51°) ≈ (0.6293, 0.7771)

xyOP

P(cos 51°, sin 51°) ≈ (0.6293, 0.7771)

Highlighted: the projection on the x-axis — cosine, x ≈ 0.6293.

All four functions of 51°
FunctionExact valueDecimal
sin 51°—≈ 0.7771
cos 51°—≈ 0.6293
tan 51°—≈ 1.2349
cot 51°—≈ 0.8098

See Also

FAQ

What is cos 51°?

cos 51° ≈ 0.6293

Is there an exact value of cos 51°?

Yes: 51° is a multiple of 3°, and the values of such angles can be written with square roots — but the expression is unwieldy, with nested radicals built from the values of 18° and 15° (3° = 18° − 15°). In practice the decimal is used: cos 51° ≈ 0.6293.

Why does a calculator show 0.7422 for cos 51?

The calculator is in radian mode (RAD): it takes cos 51 as the cosine of 51 radians, cos 51 rad ≈ 0.7422. Switch it to degrees (DEG): cos 51° ≈ 0.6293. In radians the value is never undefined: π is irrational, so a whole number of radians never lands exactly on an axis.