Gigabit

The gigabit is a multiple of the unit bit for digital information or computer storage. The prefix giga (symbol G) is defined in the International System of Units (SI) as a multiplier of 10⁹ (1 billion, short scale),[1] and therefore

1 gigabit = 10⁹bits = 1000000000bits.

This article is about the unit of information. For the networking technology, see Gigabit Ethernet.

Multiples of bits
Decimal Value SI 1000 10^3 kbit kilobit 1000^2 10^6 Mbit megabit 1000^3 10^9 Gbit gigabit 1000^4 10^12 Tbit terabit 1000^5 10^15 Pbit petabit 1000^6 10^18 Ebit exabit 1000^7 10^21 Zbit zettabit 1000^8 10^24 Ybit yottabit	Binary Value IEC JEDEC 1024 2^10 Kibit kibibit Kbit kilobit 1024^2 2^20 Mibit mebibit Mbit megabit 1024^3 2^30 Gibit gibibit Gbit gigabit 1024^4 2^40 Tibit tebibit - 1024^5 2^50 Pibit pebibit - 1024^6 2^60 Eibit exbibit - 1024^7 2^70 Zibit zebibit - 1024^8 2^80 Yibit yobibit -
See also Nibble Byte Orders of magnitude of data

The gigabit has the unit symbol Gbit or Gb.

Using the common byte size of 8 bits, 1 Gbit is equal to 125 megabytes (MB) or approximately 119 mebibytes (MiB).

The gigabit is closely related to the gibibit, a unit multiple derived from the binary prefix gibi (symbol Gi) of the same order of magnitude,[2] which is equal to 2³⁰bits = 1073741824bits, or approximately 7% larger than the gigabit.

See also

• SI prefix
• Gigabyte
• Gigabit per second
• Gigabit Ethernet
• 10 Gigabit Ethernet

References

1. The NIST Reference on Constants, Units, and Uncertainty: SI prefixes
2. The NIST Reference on Constants, Units, and Uncertainty: Prefixes for binary multiples