Billion

IMPORTANT NOTE
This article is not an official FIGU publication.

You saw the word billion somewhere did you? - It probably represented a thousand million. It can be checked in the original document if it has interested you.

Continue reading if you want but most persons don't care about that, you don't have to care about the numbers.

Long and short scale

The website (usually) and FIGU use long scale, however there are many translations of FIGU works created by many from all over the world. Which may have used the short scale billion in the translation of any numbers listed in the text. Often the number is presented in text form which maintains the value intended, example: ten million million light years.

Photo Gallery

Unfortunately the website uses numbers from the short and long scale in a sometimes intermixed form and often the reference has not been provided to the original text, this is understandable as individuals from every nation use the website and the content has generally been a kind of international collaborative effort. Please help us clear up the various historical discrepancies on the website for moving forward together, if you find that a number is wrong after verifying it from the original source text, please leave a comment asking an editor to correct it with some information about the source text so we can reference it, so that others can enjoy the content.

The correct usage of Billion for FIGU works is long scale billion. Its to keep consistency and the common transferable scale between texts for the readers comfort and reading pleasure. Comes natively in long count, just the way it has been presented at source. We should continue to present it this way with notes about long scale so the individual reader can change the numbers to short count reliably and not unconditionally to prevent confusion. Just leave a link reference to this page to any number over a billion.

---

Method of saying same thing 1

---

Long Scale - Billion = 1,000,000,000,000
Short Scale - Billion = 1,000,000,000 ^{(Not for FIGU translations please)}

Long Scale - Trillion = 1,000,000,000,000,000,000
Short Scale - Trillion = 1,000,000,000,000 ^{(Not for FIGU translations please)}

Long Scale - Quadrillion = 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
Short Scale - Quadrillion = 1,000,000,000,000,000 ^{(Not for FIGU translations please)}

---

Method of saying same thing 2

---

The long and short scales are two of several large-number naming systems for integer powers of ten, that use the same words with different meanings:

Long scale billion means a million millions (10¹²), trillion means a million billions (10¹⁸)

Short scale billion means a thousand millions (10⁹), trillion means a thousand billions (10¹²)

---

Method of saying same thing 3

---

The relationship between the numeric values and the corresponding names in the two scales can be described as:

Value in scientific notation	Metric prefix		Value in positional notation	Short scale		Long scale
	Prefix	Symbol		Name	Logic	Name	Alternative name	Logic
100			1	One		One		1×1,000,0000
101	Deca	D or da	10	Ten		Ten		10×1,000,0000
102	Hecto	h	100	Hundred		Hundred		100×1,000,0000
103	Kilo	k	1,000	Thousand	1×1,000×1,0000	Thousand		1,000×1,000,0000
106	Mega	M	1,000,000	Million	1×1,000×1,0001	Million		1×1,000,0001
109	Giga	G	1,000,000,000	Billion	1×1,000×1,0002	Thousand Million	Milliard	1,000×1,000,0001
1012	Tera	T	1,000,000,000,000	Trillion	1×1,000×1,0003	Billion		1×1,000,0002
1015	Peta	P	1,000,000,000,000,000	Quadrillion	1×1,000×1,0004	Thousand Billion	Billiard	1,000×1,000,0002
1018	Exa	E	1,000,000,000,000,000,000	Quintillion	1×1,000×1,0005	Trillion		1×1,000,0003
1021	Zetta	Z	1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000	Sextillion	1×1,000×1,0006	Thousand Trillion	Trilliard	1,000×1,000,0003
1024	Yotta	Y	1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000	Septillion	1×1,000×1,0007	Quadrillion		1×1,000,0004
Etc.				To next named order of magnitude: multiply by 1,000		To next named order of magnitude: multiply by 1,000,000