Gourt Home::Gourt :: Orders of magnitude (data)
This is a list of orders of magnitude for data (or information), measured in bits. This article assumes a formal attitude towards terminology. That means two things:
- A group of 8 bits in a computer is called an octet. A byte is the same for most practical purposes, but does not equal 8 bits on all computer architectures.
- The decimal prefixes kilo, mega etc. are strictly powers of 10. The powers of 2 are the binary prefixes kibi, mebi etc.
Accordingly, 8192 bits of data are a kibioctet and 8000 bits are a kilooctet.
1 bit
- 1 bit – True or false
- 3 bits – The size of an octal digit.
- 4 bits – A semioctet or nibble (sometimes spelled nybble). The size of a hexadecimal digit.
- 5 bits – Size of code points in the Baudot code, used in telex communication.
- 6 bits – Size of code points in the Braille code, a tactile writing system for the blind.
- 7 bits – Size of code points in the ASCII character set.
- 8 bits – An octet. Equivalent to a byte on many computer architectures.
10 bits
- 10 bits – One decabit
- 12 bits – Wordlength of the legendary PDP-8 of Digital Equipment Corporation (built from 1965 -1990)
- 16 bits – In many programming languages, the size of an integer capable of holding 65,536 different values.
- 16 bits – The "word size" (instruction length) for the various "second generation" console systems, including: Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis
- 32 bits (4 octets) – Size of an integer capable of holding 4,294,967,296 different values.
- 32 bits – Size of an IEEE 754 single-precision floating point number.
- 32 bits – Size of addresses in IPv4, the current Internet protocol.
- 56 bits (7 octets) – Cipher strength of the DES encryption standard.
- 64 bits (8 octets) – Size of an integer capable of holding 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 different values.
- 64 bits – Size of an IEEE 754 double-precision floating point number.
- 80 bits (10 octets) – Size of an extended precision floating point number, for intermediate calculations that can be performed in floating point units of most processors of the x86 family.
102 bits – One hectobit
- 100 bits – One hectobit
- 128 bits (16 octets) – Size of addresses in IPv6, the coming Internet protocol.
- Minimum cipher strength of the Rijndael and AES encryption standards, and of the widely used MD5 cryptographic message digest algorithm.
- 160 bits – Maximum key length of the SHA-1, standard Tiger (hash), and Tiger2 cryptographic message digest algorithms.
- 256 bits (32 octets) – Minimum key length for the recommended strong cryptographic message digests in 2004.
- 512 bits (64 octets) – Maximum key length for the standard strong cryptographic message digests in 2004.
103 bits – One kilobit
- 1,024 bits (210 bits, 128 octets) – One kibibit.
- 1,288 bits – Approximate maximum capacity of a standard Magnetic stripe card.
- 4,096 bits (212 bits, 512 octets) – Typical sector size, and minimum space allocation unit on computer storage volumes, with most file systems.
- 4,704 bits (588 octets) – Uncompressed single-channel frame length in standard MPEG audio (75 frames per second and per channel), with medium quality 8-bit sampling at 44,100 Hz (or 16-bit sampling at 22,050 Hz).
- 8,000 bits (103 octets) – One kilooctet.
- 8,192 bits (213 bits, 1,024 octets) – One kibioctet.
- 9,408 bits (1,176 octets) – Uncompressed single-channel frame length in standard MPEG audio (75 frames per second and per channel), with standard 16-bit sampling at 44,100 Hz.
104 bits
- 15,350 bits – one screen of data displayed on an 8-bit monochrome text console (80x24)
- 20 - 50 kbits – one page of typewritten text (uncompressed, depends on size of type and number of possible glyphs)
105 bits
- 100 kbits – approximate size of this article
106 bits – One megabit
- 1,048,576 bits (220 bits) – One mebibit.
- 1,978,560 bits – A one-page, standard-resolution black-and-white fax (1728 × 1145 pixels).
- 4,147,200 bits – One frame of uncompressed NTSC DVD video (720 × 480 × 12 bpp Y'CbCr).
- 4,976,640 bits – One frame of uncompressed PAL DVD video (720 × 576 × 12 bpp Y'CbCr).
- 8,000,000 bits (106 octets) – One megaoctet.
- 8,388,608 bits (223 bits, 220 octets) – One mebioctet.
107 bits
- 11,520,000 bits – Capacity of a lower-resolution computer monitor (as of 2006), 800 × 600 pixels, 24 bpp.
- 11,796,480 bits – Capacity of a 3.5" floppy disk, colloquially known as 1.44 megabyte but actually 1.44 × 1000 × 1024 bytes.
- 25 Mbits – Amount of data in a typical color slide.
- 25,964,951 bits – Size of the largest known Mersenne prime. All 25,964,951 bits are 1.
- 46,080,000 bits – Capacity of a high-resolution computer monitor (as of 2006), 1600 × 1200 pixels, 24 bpp.
- 50–100 megabits – Amount of information in a typical phone book.
108 bits
- 150 Mbits – Amount of data in a large foldout map.
- 423,360,000 bits: A 5-minute-length audio recording, in CDDA quality
109 bits – One gigabit
- 1,073,741,824 bits (230 bits) – One gibibit.
- 5.45 bits (650 mebioctets) – Capacity of a regular compact disc.
- 5.89 bits (702 mebioctets) – capacity of a large regular compact disc.
- 6.4 bits – Capacity of the human genome, 3.2 billion base pairs (each pair counts 2 for 2 bits of data).
- 8,000,000,000 bits (109 octets) – One gigaoctet.
- 8,589,934,592 bits (233 bits, 230 octets) – One gibioctet.
1010 bits
- 4.04 bits (4.7 gigaoctets) – capacity of a single-layer, single-sided DVD.
- 2.16 bits (2.7 gigabytes) – size of the English Wikipedia without images (TomeRaider_database).
1011 bits
- 1.46 bits (17 gigaoctets) – Capacity of a double-sided, dual-layered DVD.
- 2.15 bits (25 gigaoctets) – Capacity of a single-sided, single-layered 12 cm Blu-ray disc
1012 bits – One terabit
- 1012 bits (125 gigaoctets) – Approximate size of all Wikimedia projects.
- 1,099,511,627,776 bits (240 bits, more than 137 gigaoctets) – One tebibit.
- 1.6 bits (200 gigaoctets) – Capacity of a hard disk that would be considered moderately large in 2004.
- (approximately) 4.12 bits (515 gibioctets) – As of 2002, data of pi to the largest number of digits ever calculated (1.24 trillion).
- 8,000,000,000,000 bits (1012 octets) – One teraoctet.
- 8,796,093,022,208 bits (243 bits, 240 octets) – One tebioctet.
1013 bits
- 1 bits (1.25 teraoctets) – capacity of a human being's functional memory, according to Raymond Kurzweil in The Singularity Is Near, p. 126.
1014 bits
- 1.5 bits (18.75 teraoctets) – Amount of information in the Library of Congress, if it were all digitized.
1015 bits – One petabit
- 1,000,000,000,000,000 bits (1015 bits, 125 teraoctets) – One petabit
- 1,125,899,906,842,624 bits (250 bits, less than 141 teraoctets) – One pebibit
- 2.4 bits (300 teraoctets) – Size of the Internet Archive in 2004.
- 8,000,000,000,000,000 bits (1015 octets) – One petaoctet
- 9,007,199,254,740,992 bits (253 bits, 250 octets) – One pebioctet
1016 bits
- 4.5 bits (5.625 petaoctets) – Estimated hard drive space in Google's server farm in 2004.
1017 bits
800,000,000,000,000,000 bits, Data's storage capacity
1018 bits – One exabit
- 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 bits (1018 bits, 125 petaoctets) – One exabit
- 1,152,921,504,606,846,976 bits (260 bits, more than 144 petaoctets) – One exbibit
- 1.6 bits (200 petaoctets) – Total amount of printed material in the world.
- 8,000,000,000,000,000,000 bits (1018 octets) – One exaoctet
- 9,223,372,036,854,775,808 bits (263 bits, 260 octets) – One exbioctet
1019 bits
1020 bits
1021 bits – One zettabit
- 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 bits (1021 bits, 125 exaoctets) – One zettabit
- 1,180,591,620,717,411,303,424 bits (270 bits, less than 148 exaoctets) – One zebibit
- 8,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 bits (1021 octets) – One zettaoctet
- 9,444,732,965,739,290,427,392 bits (273 bits, 270 octets) – One zebioctet
1022 bits
1023 bits
1024 bits – One yottabit
- 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 bits (1024 bits, 125 zettaoctets) – One yottabit
- 1,208,925,819,614,629,174,706,176 bits (280 bits, more than 151 zettaoctets) – One yobibit
- 8,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 bits (1024 octets) – One yottaoctet
- 9,671,406,556,917,033,397,649,408 bits (283 bits, 280 octets) – One yobioctet
"Orders of magnitude (data)"