How Far Is the NBA 3-Point Line From the Basket?

In metric units, 23 feet 9 inches is 7.24 metres and 22 feet is 6.71 metres. The rulebook states the arc distance in feet and inches, and the metric figures are converted from them.

The line is not a full circle. The court is 50 feet wide, so the basket sits 25 feet from each sideline, and a line drawn 3 feet in from the sideline is 22 feet from the center of the court. The arc of 23 feet 9 inches reaches farther than that, so the line runs straight along the sidelines in the corners and curves as an arc in the rest of the court. That is why the distance in the corner, 22 feet, is shorter than the arc.

Rule 5, Section I says a successful field goal attempt from the area on or inside the three-point line counts as two points, and one from the area outside the line counts as three. The shooter has to meet three conditions:

• The shooter must have at least one foot on the floor outside the three-point line before the attempt.
• The shooter may not be touching the floor on or inside the line.
• The shooter may touch the line, or land in the two-point area, after the ball is released.

A shot taken with a foot on the line is therefore a two-point attempt, because the line itself belongs to the two-point area. A player who jumps from outside the line and lands inside it still gets three points if the shot is good.

The same rule says a successful free throw counts one point. A shot from outside the line that goes in is worth three points no matter how it gets there, as long as the shooter's feet were behind the line when it was taken.

The rulebook gives the other distances from the basket and the lines on the court. The free throw line is drawn across the lane circles, parallel to the end line, 15 feet from the plane of the face of the backboard. The restricted area under the basket is marked by an arc 4 feet from the center of the ring, the court is 94 feet long and 50 feet wide inside the boundary lines, and the rim itself is 10 feet above the floor, as described on the page about the height of NBA rims.

All distances come from Rule 1 and Rule 5 of the official 2025-26 NBA playing rules. The corner distance of 22 feet is the figure printed on the court diagram of the rulebook; the written rule gives the arc distance and the 3-foot parallel lines. Metric figures are calculated from the figures in feet.

The rules are reviewed each year. This page was checked against the 2025-26 edition. More basketball pages are collected on the NBA hub, and the page about steps in basketball covers another rule from the same book.