Tan 81 Degrees

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

What is tan 81°?

Answer

tan 81° ≈
6.3138

Angle in radians: 81° = 9π/20. The point of the angle is in quadrant I, where tangent is positive.

≈ — rounded to 4 decimal places. An exact form of tan 81° in square roots exists, but it is unwieldy — nested radicals.

tan 81° = sin 81° / cos 81° ≈ 6.3138

xyOP

P(cos 81°, sin 81°) ≈ (0.1564, 0.9877)

T(1, tan 81°) ≈ (1, 6.3138) — where line OP meets the line x = 1; T is beyond the drawing, the arrow points to it.

All four functions of 81°
FunctionExact valueDecimal
sin 81°—≈ 0.9877
cos 81°—≈ 0.1564
tan 81°—≈ 6.3138
cot 81°—≈ 0.1584

See Also

FAQ

What is tan 81°?

tan 81° ≈ 6.3138

Is there an exact value of tan 81°?

Yes: 81° 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: tan 81° ≈ 6.3138.

Why does a calculator show −0.8110 for tan 81?

The calculator is in radian mode (RAD): it takes tan 81 as the tangent of 81 radians, tan 81 rad ≈ −0.8110. Switch it to degrees (DEG): tan 81° ≈ 6.3138. In radians the value is never undefined: π is irrational, so a whole number of radians never lands exactly on an axis.