Using the steel section catalogue
What this catalogue covers
This is a browsable database of steel section properties covering 5,496 sizes across 54 section types, drawn from three catalogues that most steelwork actually uses: the UK Blue Book (SCI P363), Continental European sections, and the AISC Shapes Database for American work. Every size is tabulated, searchable and exportable, and each one also has its own reference page with the full property set.
The point of putting all three in one place is that real projects mix them. A structure detailed in the UK may specify an IPE from a European mill; a Vietnamese or Middle Eastern job may sit between EN and ASTM practice. Rather than keeping three separate tables open, you can search one and compare like for like.
- UK Blue Book (SCI P363)
- 1,336 sizes - UB, UC, UBP, PFC, angles, tees, ASB
- Continental European
- 1,861 sizes - IPE, HE, UPN, cold-formed channels, purlins, bars
- AISC Shapes Database v16.0
- 2,299 sizes - W, HP, C, MC, HSS, WT, L shapes
- Total
- 5,496 sizes across 54 section types
Section families in the catalogue
Sections are grouped by family rather than by catalogue, so a search for a shape finds it wherever it comes from. The families and their governing standards are:
- Open sections (I and H)
- UB, UC, UBP to BS EN 10365; IPE, HE to EN 10365; AISC W, HP, S, M
- Hollow sections, hot-finished
- CHS, SHS, RHS, EHS to BS EN 10210-2
- Hollow sections, cold-formed
- CHS, SHS, RHS to BS EN 10219-2; AISC HSS
- Channels
- PFC to BS 4-1, including back-to-back and laced; UPN; AISC C and MC
- Angles
- Equal and unequal to BS EN 10056-1, including back-to-back; AISC L
- Tees
- Tees split from UB and UC; AISC WT
- Bars and purlins
- Flat, round and square bar to EN 10058, 10059; Z and C purlins
Angles are the largest single family at 1,057 sizes, because equal, unequal and back-to-back arrangements each multiply out. Hollow sections come next at 1,821 across hot-finished and cold-formed, which is why the search box matters more here than a nested menu would.
Finding a section
The Find tab searches every catalogue at once by designation, family or source. Type a size the way you would say it - "75x75x12", "IPE 300", "shs 80x80x4", "W8x24" - and matching sections appear from all three catalogues with their mass and source shown, so you can tell a Blue Book angle from a Continental one at a glance.
The multiplication sign in a designation is written as a symbol (EA 75x75x12 is stored as EA 75 by 75 by 12), but you do not need to type it that way: a plain letter x matches. Searching is by substring, so a partial designation such as "203x203" returns every UC in that serial size.
If you already know the design forces, enter them on the left of the Find tab and the catalogue returns only sections that pass, sorted lightest first, with the governing check named. That turns a lookup into a section-sizing exercise without leaving the page.
Properties and capacity
Selecting a section opens its full property table: dimensions, mass per metre, area, second moments of area, radii of gyration, elastic and plastic section moduli, torsion and warping constants, and the classification-relevant ratios. Angle sections additionally carry their principal-axis properties, which is what they must be designed about.
The Capacity tab runs a Eurocode 3 (EN 1993-1-1) check on the selected section in S275 or S355: cross-section classification, bending resistance about both axes, lateral-torsional buckling, compression buckling and the bending-plus-axial interaction. Hollow sections are tabulated for S355. Any table can be exported to Excel.
For a deeper single-section study, two companion tools go further than the catalogue does: the section properties calculator derives geometry for shapes that are not in any catalogue, including custom and built-up sections, and the steel section check tool works through a full EN 1993-1-1 verification with the intermediate values shown. The catalogue is the place to find a section; those are the places to interrogate one.
Standards referenced
Section data is reproduced from the published tables rather than recomputed, so the values match the source documents a checker will hold you to.
- BS EN 10365:2017
- Hot-rolled steel channels, I and H sections - dimensions and mass
- BS EN 10210-2:2006
- Hot-finished structural hollow sections - tolerances and properties
- BS EN 10219-2:2006
- Cold-formed welded structural hollow sections
- BS EN 10056-1:1999
- Equal and unequal leg angles - dimensions
- BS 4-1:2005
- Structural steel sections - hot-rolled, including PFC
- EN 10058 / EN 10059
- Hot-rolled flat and square steel bars
- AISC Shapes Database v16.0
- American standard shapes, imperial primary with metric derived
- SCI P363
- Steel building design data - the UK Blue Book
Assumptions and limits
The catalogue reproduces published section data; it does not recompute geometry from first principles, so values match the source standard including its rounding. Where a catalogue lists two sections with the same nominal size but different mass, both are kept as distinct entries rather than merged.
Capacity checks follow EN 1993-1-1 for S275 and S355 and cover the common member checks - classification, bending, lateral-torsional buckling, compression buckling and interaction. They are a design aid, not a substitute for a full member design: connection design, serviceability, fatigue, fire and second-order effects are outside what a section-level check can tell you, and the responsibility for the result stays with the engineer.