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Author: Admin | 2025-04-28
To be used in most situations. Instead, various multiples are commonly used. DSL providers usually advertise high-speed internet connections with 300 megabits per second (Mbit/s). And the storage capacities of hard drives or USB sticks are usually given in megabytes, gigabytes, or terabytes.The following table provides an overview of bit and byte multiples: Data units in bits Data quantities in bytes Bit = 1 or 0 Byte (B) = 8 Bits Kilobit (Kbit) = 1,000 Bits Kilobyte (KB) = 1,024 Bytes Megabit (Mbit) = 1,000 Kbits Megabyte (MB) = 1,024 KB Gigabit (Gbit) = 1,000 Mbits Gigabyte (GB) = 1,024 MB Terabit (Tbit) = 1,000 Gbits Terabyte (TB) = 1,024 GB Petabit (Pbit) = 1,000 Tbits Petabyte (PB) = 1,024 TB Exabit (Ebit) = 1,000 Pbits Exabyte (GB) = 1,024 PB Zettabit (Zbit) = 1,000 Ebits Zettabyte (ZB) = 1,024 EB Yottabit (Ybit) = 1,000 Zbits Yottabyte (YB) = 1,024 ZB Brontobit (Bbit) = 1,000 Ybits Brontobyte (BB) = 1,024 YB There are two systems for labeling data quantities: using decimal prefixes and binary prefixes. Decimal prefixes are by far more commonly used and are the ones shown in the above table. To learn more about the way bits and bytes are converted, see our article on storage units. Various storage units in terms of bits The following bit rates are often used when talking about data transmission or the reading/writing speeds of hardware and storage devices: Kbit/s: Kilobits per second Mbit/s: Megabits per second Gbit/s: Gigabits per second Tbit/s: Terabits per second Terms like “gigabytes” and “terabytes” can be hard to grasp. To get an idea of what these data quantities actually mean, take a look at these concrete examples:Storage capacity:1 MB = approx. 1 book1 GB = approx. 3,334 books1 TB = approx. 3,334,000 booksData use:approx. 100–200 KB = 1 image in a messenger appapprox. 100–200 MB = 1 hour-long video callapprox. 300 GB = 100 hours of video streaming How did bits get their name? The term “bit” was first used by John W. Turkey, an American mathematician. Turkey shortened “binary information digit” into “bit” in a Bell Labs memo. The word became more widely used after Claude E. Shannon included it in his 1948 treatise “A Mathematical Theory of Communication”. Vannevar Bush used the phrase “bits of information” to refer to truth values that used to be saved on computer punch cards. Keep in mind that
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