Tan 16 Degrees

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

What is tan 16°?

Answer

tan 16° ≈
0.2867

Angle in radians: 16° = 4π/45. The point of the angle is in quadrant I, where tangent is positive.

≈ — rounded to 4 decimal places. tan 16° can't be written with square roots: 16° is not a multiple of 3°.

tan 16° = sin 16° / cos 16° ≈ 0.2867

xyOP

P(cos 16°, sin 16°) ≈ (0.9613, 0.2756)

T(1, tan 16°) ≈ (1, 0.2867) — where line OP meets the line x = 1.

All four functions of 16°
FunctionExact valueDecimal
sin 16°—≈ 0.2756
cos 16°—≈ 0.9613
tan 16°—≈ 0.2867
cot 16°—≈ 3.4874

See Also

FAQ

What is tan 16°?

tan 16° ≈ 0.2867

Why does tan 16° have no exact value?

A trigonometric value of a whole number of degrees can be written with square roots only when the angle is a multiple of 3°. 16° is not, so no such exact form exists; the value is used as a decimal: tan 16° ≈ 0.2867.

Why does a calculator show 0.3006 for tan 16?

The calculator is in radian mode (RAD): it takes tan 16 as the tangent of 16 radians, tan 16 rad ≈ 0.3006. Switch it to degrees (DEG): tan 16° ≈ 0.2867. In radians the value is never undefined: π is irrational, so a whole number of radians never lands exactly on an axis.