I present a novel curvature profilometer devised fur the profile measurement of aspheric and free-form surfaces on the nanometer scale. A profile is reconstructed from measuring the curvature of a test part of the surface at several locations along a line. For profile measurement of free-farm surfaces, methods based on local part curvature sensing have strong appeal. Unlike full-aperture interferometry they do not require customized null optics. The measurement accuracy of the curvature profilometer was assessed by comparison with a well-calibrated interferometer in NIST. Experimental results prove that the maximum discrepancy turns out to be 37 nm on the 28 mm measurement range for the spherical mirror.