What is Mount Everest’s officially recognized height?

Mount Everest’s officially recognized height is 8,848.86 metres.

Nepal and China announced the measurement of 8,848.86 metres in December 2020. This figure includes Everest’s snow and ice cap and replaced earlier commonly quoted measurements, including Nepal’s 1954 height of 8,848 metres and China’s rock-height measurement of 8,844.43 metres.

Everest is part of the Himalayas on the Nepal–China border. In Nepal it is called Sagarmatha, while in Tibet it is known as Chomolungma. The mountain’s summit lies in the death zone, where the low oxygen level makes prolonged human activity extremely dangerous.

Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay made the first confirmed ascent on 29 May 1953. Everest’s height can change slightly because of geological movement, snow conditions and measurement methods, which explains why different historical figures appear in older sources.