You measure from the bottom of the meniscus. The top of the meniscus can vary wildly depending on the diameter of the tube, or the air pressure, or room temperature.
top
When you read a scale on the side of a container with a meniscus, such as a graduated cylinder or volumetric flask, it's important that the measurement accounts for the ... For mercury, take the measurement from the top of the meniscus. ...
calibration mark
Read volume from the bottom of the meniscus (the crescent shaped pattern that many liquids form.)
If the colored liquid is opaque (you can't see through it) you can't see the bottom of the meniscus. If the liquid is like mercury, you can't see through it but it doesn't make any difference because the meniscus is reverse from that of water. You read the top.
This is called a meniscus, from the greek work for 'crescent'. You should meaure from the bottom of it when it is concave (like a smile) or the top when it is convex (like a frown).
The meniscus is the concave line of liquid that forms in a graduated cylinder (measuring volume) due to that liquid's adhesion (the tendency to want to stick to other things). When measuring a liquid's volume in a graduated cylinder, you read the volume from the bottom of the meniscus. Therefore, the meniscus does not measure anything, it is where you measure a liquid's volume from.
The "bottom of a curved line" made by the liquid in a graduated cylinder could be called the "measuring line" or "reference line" in the application of that piece of labratory equipment. The curved surface of the liquid itself is called the meniscus, and we look to the bottom of the meniscus to make our reading as to the volume of the liquid in the graduated cylinder. The liquid in the cylinder "grabs" the sides of the cylinder and "pulls itself up" just a bit, and that creates the curve in the surface of the liquid. And that curve, the meniscus (which is from the Greek word for crescent), leaves us with a problem: where do we "read" the volume marked off by the graduations along the side of the cylinder? And the answer is, "At the bottom of the meniscus."
When you read a scale on the side of a container with a meniscus, such as a graduated cylinder or volumetric flask, it's important that the measurement accounts for the ... For mercury, take the measurement from the top of the meniscus. ...
A graduated cylinder is used to measure liquid volume in milliliters, mL. When you place a liquid into a glass graduated cylinder, you will see that the "line" at the top of the column of liquid is actually curved downward. This is called the meniscus. When you measure the liquid volume, you record the volume in mL at the bottom of the meniscus.
at the bottom of the meniscus
The meniscus rule states that you always measure the volume of a water-based solution from the bottom of the meniscus when you are using a graduated cylinder.
calibration mark
Water in a glass graduated cylinder adheres to the sides of the cylinder, forming a meniscus which is an upward curve. When reading volume in a cylinder, look at the meniscus at eye level. Read the volume at the bottom of the curve.
a meniscus
Level with the bottom of the fluid's meniscus
You must read from the bottom of the meniscus. In a narrow, graduated glass cylinder, water has a slightly domed surface, with the centre being higher than the side, so giving a false reading if the centre height is taken.
The meniscus is a curve in the surface of a liquid that is caused by surface tension and by the attraction between the liquid and the sides of the container. The bottom of the meniscus represents the most accurate measurement because the lines of a graduated cylinder are in the middle of the graduated cylinder.