The ​arc length​ of a circle is the distance along the outside of that circle between two specified points. If you were to walk one-fourth of the way around a large circle and you knew the circle's circumference, the arc length of the section you walked would simply be the circumference of the circle, 2π​r​, divided by four. The straight-line distance across the circle between those points, meanwhile, is called a chord.

If you know the measure of the central angle ​θ​, which is the angle between the lines originating at the center of the circle and connecting to the ends of the arc, you can easily calculate the arc length:

Sometimes, however, you are not given ​θ​ . But if you know the length of the associated chord ​c​, you can calculate the arc length even without this information, using the following formula:

The steps below assume a circle with a radius of 5 meters and a chord of 2 meters.

Divide each side by 2​r​ (which equals the diameter of the circle). This gives

In this example

Since you now have

you must find the angle that yields this sine value.

Use your calculator's ARCSIN function, often labeled SIN^-1, to do this, or refer too the Rapid Tables calculator (see Resources).

Going back to the equation

input the known values:

Note that for relatively short arc lengths, the chord length will be very close to the arc length, as a visual inspection suggests.