Ruler / Meterstick

Hi, and welcome to English Forums.

As an American, I think in feet and yards and miles, not meters and kilometers.

The word yardstick is therefore alive and well in the US, but meterstick is not.

A ruler is generally only about a foot or 18 inches long. I would not call a yardstick a ruler -- it's too long to match my sense of what a ruler is

While a "ruler" can be any (reasonable) length, a "meterstick" presumably has to be a meter long. "meterstick" (or "metrestick" as we would spell it in BrE) is not a common word. In fact, I don't recall ever hearing it used. Many dictionaries seem to eschew it, though it is listed in M-W:

Mr Wordy
There is a more common word "yardstick", but this is more often used figuratively than literally.

I don't know about that -- I use mine literally quite often, to fish out things that fall behind the dresser.

khoffto fish out things that fall behind the dresser.

Or the little ***** that the cats manage to get there.

Thanks very much for all the answers. Now I see that it's better use the word 'ruler'.