Talk:1,000,000,000

Latest comment: 5 days ago by RMCD bot in topic Move discussion in progress

1000,000,000 = 10^9 = 1 trillion — Preceding unsigned comment added by 115.98.232.13 (talk) 17:59, 13 March 2024 (UTC)Reply

trivial edit

This is the page to jot down interesting facts about 10-digit numbers. If enough (at least three) interesting facts are gathered about a particular 10-digit number, it could possibly warrant its own article. PrimeFan 19:31, 6 October 2005 (UTC)Reply

Isn't it a bit too trivial to be mentioned here that a certain number is repdigit. It is trivial for numbers in he decimal representation to decide if it is repdigit or not. If we include this, divisibility by seven would be less trivial and should be mentioned. So I am going to delete repdigit now. Andreask 16:15, 10 June 2007 (UTC) Vvvv — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.83.143.11 (talk) 21:32, 8 October 2013 (UTC)Reply

error edit

Error: factorization of billion is 2^9 * 5^9

It should be 2(5^9); it is almost too trivial to have I guess. BMF203 (talk) 17:57, 1 March 2009 (UTC)Reply

Nope. 2^9 5^9 is correct. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 19:35, 1 March 2009 (UTC)Reply


Quote: About 10^9 years ago, the first multicellular organisms appeared on Earth.

They appeared before that, I didn't want to change this though as I don't have a reference to the real figure. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.43.62.154 (talk) 17:49, 27 May 2009 (UTC)Reply

Changed "multicellular organisms" to "multicellular eukaryotes", per our article evolution of multicellularity. Thanks. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:45, 27 May 2009 (UTC)Reply

Another Billion definition edit

In English (in the UK) and the rest of Europe 1 billion is 1,000,000,000,000.

It is logical. Viz. 1 million 1,000,000 1 billion (bi= 2 sets of millions) 1,000,000,000,000 1 trillion (tri= 3 sets of millions) 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 1 quadrillion (quad= 4 sets of millions) 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 1 quintillion (quin= 5 sets of millions) 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 etc.

Why count any differently?

It has to do with the long and short scales. Voortle 01:45, 3 August 2006 (UTC)Reply
In the UK, 1 billion _was_ 10^12 but is currently very widely understood to be 10^9 - see long and short scales for the discussion. If you believe your version to be true, please find any recent supporting definition from, say, a BBC or government or national newspaper website and post the link to Talk:long and short scales. Thanks, Ian Cairns 01:52, 3 August 2006 (UTC)Reply
The long scale comes from the Latin. But if we have mille (thousand), millione (million), and milliard (109), why not bille (1012), billion (1015), billiard (1018), trille (1021), etc.? Neither the "short" nor "long" scale is entirely internally consistent. It's better to go with the more concise naming system, in either case. Why use two words when one will suffice? --Eideteker (talk) 20:07, 4 January 2009 (UTC)Reply
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Requested move 2006 edit

The result of the debate was no move. —Mets501 (talk) 16:46, 1 October 2006 (UTC)Reply

100000000 (number) to billion. Similar to how 1000000 (number) was moved to million, this article should be at billion as it's the most common name for the number in English speaking countries, it's easier to read than 1000000000 (number) and most links referring to the number link to billion. Then when the move is completed, make a link in the article to billion (company) and the older meaning of billion. See also similar proposal for ten million and hundred million. Voortle 00:03, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

Survey edit

Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one sentence explanation and sign your vote with ~~~~
  • Support per my reasons above. Voortle 00:24, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose. The current title is unwieldy but unambiguous. Why upset the minority who use the other definition of billion? It's not that hard to read. Your point about "most links referring to the number link to billion" is totally inaccurat: see my counts below. jnestorius(talk) 00:53, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
    • (following comments by me and Voortle moved up from after the counting subsection jnestorius(talk) 22:18, 23 September 2006 (UTC))Reply
    • Pretty conclusive. jnestorius(talk) 00:53, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
    • Yeah, but usually those links almost always link originally from billion. If we can have List of billionaires, we can have this article at billion. Voortle 14:03, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
      • Nobody uses "billionaire" to mean "someone with 10E12 dollars". As for moving links, that's why disambiguation pages exist. jnestorius(talk) 22:18, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose, there are two definitions for things over 999,999,999. 132.205.44.134 04:05, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose - for you billion may have a unique meaning, but for much of the world the word is ambiguous. 1000000000 is uniquely understood by both sides. This was the whole reason for creating the article Long and short scales. Ian Cairns 08:13, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
  • Support. As Voortle said, we can link to the other, less common meaning of billion meaning "1,000,000,000,000" at the top of the article so that there won't be any confusion. How do we expect people to know how many zeroes this has? 1000000000 (number) will confuse even more people than billion, because many people won't know how many zeroes it has without having to stop and count them. 64.194.47.34 14:15, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose. A billion is a million of millions for many people. Renaming this to billion would be an example of Systemic bias--Asteriontalk 16:48, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose per Asterion, Ian Cairns, etc. — Arthur Rubin | (talk) 00:30, 28 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

Discussion edit

  • billion has two defintions:
thousand million and billion can mean 10E9
billion and trillion can mean 10E12
132.205.44.134 04:08, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
  • "billion" is the usual name for the number in English speaking countries. The other meaning of "billion" is generally used in other European languages. There's no reason to have a hard to read title to accomodate nonnative English speakers. This is the English Wikipedia after all. We shouldn't pretend like it's not. If you want to accomodate nonnative speakers, go to the simple English wikipedia. Voortle 14:00, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
(preceding Voortle comment moved up from after the counting subsection jnestorius(talk) 22:18, 23 September 2006 (UTC))Reply
  • I would support a move to 1000000000, which redirects here anyway. The "nnnnn (number)" suffix is a convention useful for small numbers, so 1776 is the year rather than the number, but the year 1 billion [sic] is unlikely to have a Wikipedia article for a looong time. jnestorius(talk) 22:18, 23 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
  • For the sake of accuracy, all of the articles mentioned below should be disambiguated to 1000000000 (number).--Asteriontalk 10:39, 24 September 2006 (UTC)Reply
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

1836311903 is not a prime number edit

1836311903 is listed as a fibonacci prime, but it is in fact divisible by 139.

You're quite right, anonymous user. 1836311903 = 139 * 461 * 28657, as I've just double-checked with Mathematica. It's still a Fibonacci number, however. I will amend the article accordingly. Thanks for pointing this out. PrimeFan 22:43, 26 October 2006 (UTC)Reply

a billion seconds ago edit

How bout,

"About a billion seconds ago the first episode of Saturday Night Live was aired" a billion seconds is 31 years? if so thats 1975! EDIT: whoops forgot sig Triangl 02:23, 7 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

What's Saturday Night Live and where is it shown? Isn't this US-centrism? Can you find some other event that the whole world will recognise? Ian Cairns 08:08, 21 November 2006 (UTC)Reply
Also that gets more and more inaccurate with a short amount of time, at least the others are over a great enough time span to make any inaccuracy unimportant. Wheatleya 21:53, 18 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

US Dollars edit

I think this...

"In finance, the possession of one billion United States dollars allows one to be ranked among the world's wealthiest individuals."

is not only a strange thing to have in this article (what does it mean by 'allows'?) , but it irrelevant (If I had one dollar less, wouldn't I still be considered weathy?). If there's no objection, I'd like to remove it.

Well the same could be said about any of the facts (eg)109 - 1 km is still over six times the earth-sun distance. The fact it is wikilinked to a page which gives further details means, IMO, it can stay, though I've taken out the 'allows'. The Yeti 00:44, 17 June 2007 (UTC)Reply

Meanwhile, possession of one billion Zimbabwean dollars probably won't buy you a cup of coffee. *Dan T.* (talk) 20:37, 4 January 2009 (UTC)Reply

Historical Accuracy edit

If one accepts that the (almost) universal defininition of Billion is the "American" one, however logical/illogical it can said to be,there remains two related issues.

1) older documents of non-American origin, especially UK/European ones may well have been written using the "British" definition. For accuracy, one needs to be aware that pre early 1970's (a personal approximation) the term would most probably refer to the non-American definition needs to be understood.

2) historical interest and fact should document and acknowledge the alternative definition. Oxford English Dictionary. Reference: http://www.askoxford.com/asktheexperts/faq/aboutwords/billion

The above clearly also affects higher number naming (as the OED notes)


Niceandtidy 13:28, 16 December 2007 (UTC)Reply

This is covered in the article Long and short scales and would be useful here - or linked. Ian Cairns (talk) 14:16, 16 December 2007 (UTC)Reply

Short and Long scale billion edit

My understanding was the a short scale billion (that which is used in the USA and almost always in the UK nowadays) is 1,000,000,000 and a long scale billion (the traditional billion from British English and most other languages) is 1,000,000,000,000. But the introduction (until I changed it a minute ago) claimed that they are exactly the same (1,000,000,000). Surely not otherwise why would they be called 'short scale billion' and 'long scale billion' if they're exactly the same? I found it very confusing.--Xania  talk 00:18, 1 May 2009 (UTC)Reply

Not only Europe, in Estados Unidos Mexicanos the number 1,000,000,000 is named "One thousand million" and billion is 1,000,000,000,000. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Deplanonose   (talkcontribs) 20:40, 19 November 2009 (UTC)Reply

Do the 10-digit numbers belong here? edit

They seem unrelated to the actual subject of the article (1000000000). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 2^3x3^2 (talkcontribs) 14:08, 12 May 2011 (UTC)Reply

42 edit

The one billion page reads as "is the natural number following 999,999,999 and preceding 1,000,000,001", while the fourty-two page reads as "is the natural number immediately following 41 and directly preceding 43." Why the absence (or appearance) of the words "immediately" and "directly"? The numbers pages should have consistency here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Khonkhortisan (talkcontribs) 03:56, 15 April 2012 (UTC)Reply

Requested move edit

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Move to 1,000,000,000. There's clear consensus to remove the parenthetical, and this appears to have the best support among the suggested titles. Cúchullain t/c 15:52, 27 February 2013 (UTC)Reply



1000000000 (number)1000000000

The (number) prefix is not necessary. Wikipedia is not likely going to have an article about a year 1000000000. Voortle (talk) 18:37, 15 February 2013 (UTC)Reply

  • Support. I would call this uncontroversial. Apteva (talk) 19:08, 15 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
  • Support. For reasons I stated above. Voortle (talk) 19:34, 15 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
  • Comment aren't bare numbers reserved for AD year articles? -- 65.92.180.137 (talk) 21:56, 15 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
We could always restore the current title circa AD 999999900. --BDD (talk) 22:11, 15 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
I note that 1000000 redirects to million, and 1,000,000? In ictu oculi (talk) 04:47, 17 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
The reason that 1000000000 (number) doesn't redirect to billion is due to long and short scales. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Arthur Rubin (talkcontribs) 05:27, 17 February 2013
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Aping edit

The description "aping US English" in the first section is political commentary and does not belong in an encyclopedia. But I'm not sure what to replace it with. "Unifying with" sounds somewhat positive to me and could incite people to change it again. Can a native speaker of English decide, please? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tompoko (talkcontribs) 20:04, 26 July 2013 (UTC)Reply

Move discussion in progress edit

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Billion which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 14:29, 24 November 2013 (UTC)Reply

Millions, Billions and Trillions edit

A Billionaire has 1,000,000,000,000 or more pounds, dollars, whatever. Therefore Billion is defined by having 12 (not 9) 0's after the 1. It seems that this definition of Billion has been replaced by an AMERICAN definition of Billion, which has only 9 0's after the 1. How are we to teach our children correctly, or even know anything about numbers if our definitions of value are constantly changed?

"After several decades of increasing informal British usage of the short scale, in 1974 the government of the UK adopted it, and it is used for all purposes including official."

We only used it "informally" because we were constantly bombarded by that version from Americans. Thats just one MORE thing the Americans have managed to force on us.

"The original meaning of the word billion is a bit complex. The prefix bi- means two, and the suffix -illion comes from the word million. But the origin of million itself is obscure."

"The original French definition of million-million was adopted by other European countries, notably England and Germany, and spread around the world through European colonialisation."

Case closed, and subject dismissed, I believe. A Billion is one million million, (1,000,000,000,000) and always will be. Any attempt to screw with that fact is pointless! Bluddy americans! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.254.180.158 (talk) 19:59, 23 March 2015 (UTC)Reply


Indeed, in Mathematics, one Billion is one Million to the Power of 2. However, you're up against those who pronounce 'drawing' as 'droring', so you'd may as well give in.

Aping and Unifying edit

The persone above who mentiond Aping...? I am English, and the term "aping" would actually be correct. Unifying would mean a two-way agreement, like both countried came to a mutual understanding, a compromise. Aping means "copying", which is what some did..."informally" apparently. However, just because SOME people decide to copy others, it doesn't mean the rest of us should be forced to...especially against our will. Stupid government!

SOME people like Hitler's ideas, and still copy this "way of life" that he preached...that doesn't mean EVERYONE in the world should do the same...does it?

FRANCE created the billion, and we spread it around a lot. Why does this "new" (american) definition overtake the original? Why dont we just start calling a car a modusbrum and eventually force the world to comply...WHERE DOES IT END? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.254.180.158 (talk) 20:12, 23 March 2015 (UTC)Reply

European Abbreviations edit

In the European Union, the abbreviation for milliard is "mrd". This is used even in those papers written in the commonly-used language, English. Please hunt this down and put it on the web page. Also, they use "mio" for million. This is done because the ill is common to both, or something like that. 173.162.253.101 (talk) 21:44, 17 May 2016 (UTC)Reply

Requested move 18 September 2016 edit

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: There seems to be consensus at commas should not be removed for readability. There does not seem to be consensus for adding the "number" disambiguator... possibly it was emerging not to add it. In any case, page stands at its title. (non-admin closure) — Andy W. (talk ·ctb) 04:08, 26 September 2016 (UTC)Reply


1,000,000,0001000000000 (number) – The previous move goes against Wikipedia:WikiProject Numbers § Article naming and number nomenclature, which states that the article title should end in "(number)" and have no separators, therefore it should be at 1000000000 (number). This was also the case at the time of the move request. I can understand why the current title might be more reader-friendly and the disambiguation suffix seems unnecessary for such big numbers, but consistency is preferable and requested moves cannot overturn wider project consensus. nyuszika7h (talk) 17:21, 18 September 2016 (UTC)Reply

  • Support move to 10^9. Without commas, it's hard to read the line of 0's. Georgia guy (talk) 18:39, 18 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
  • Comment I prefer the current title. The separators make it far easier to identify the number and I don't really understand why it needs a disambiguation term when it is obvious it is a number. The only reason I am not opposing the move is because it would contradict the titling guideline. Betty Logan (talk) 18:47, 18 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
  • Replying to both of the above comments – despite the article title the lead can still say "1,000,000,000" according to that guideline. This is the only outlier in Category:Integers, there is another similarly long one with just zeroes – 100000000 (number) – though some other big ones in that category lack the "(number)" suffix too. nyuszika7h (talk) 18:52, 18 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose. We don't add parentheticals when they aren't needed for disambiguation, and in this case, there aren't any other articles to distinguish from. The WikiProject Numbers conventions seem to be mostly talking about shorter numbers that may be confused with years (eg 496 (number) distinguishes from the year 496. Additionally, removing the commas makes it harder to read.--Cúchullain t/c 19:35, 18 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose there is no reason to disambiguate per WP:AT and the commas make the title readable. Calidum ¤ 03:10, 19 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose The new name is more confusing, as it's not obvious from the first glance how many zeros there are (and, indeed, if it's the correct number of them). At least with the comma after every three zeros, it is clear. Lugnuts Dick Laurent is dead 07:02, 19 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppoooooooooooose removing commas per readability. Support adding (number) per nom. Randy Kryn 14:16, 19 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose comma removal and oppose insertion of (number). The commas are useful, and the disambiguator is unnecessary. There will presumably eventually be a year 1000000, even if humans are no longer around to see it, but it's not really of any relevance as a year.  — Amakuru (talk) 21:32, 19 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
    Hi Amakuru. Adding the descriptor '(number)' doesn't pertain to just years. See 10000000 (number) (which could really use some commas) and other number articles. Adding '(number)' is consistent with other pages. Randy Kryn 21:47, 19 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose the addition of unnecessary disambiguators. -- Tavix (talk) 06:00, 20 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
  • Strong oppose the addition of (number) per an rfc on Wikipedia talk:Disabmiguation. No opinion on dropping the commas. Pppery 22:45, 23 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
    • @Pppery: I wasn't aware of the above RfC. Honestly, I have no idea at this point. The naming of number articles is a huge mess. nyuszika7h (talk) 19:37, 25 September 2016 (UTC)Reply

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

'eon' edit

According to https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/eon , an eon is a billion years; should it be added? Thanks in advance. --Backinstadiums (talk) 09:21, 1 February 2017 (UTC)Reply

1,000,000,000 seconds edit

More precisely, a billion seconds is exactly 31 years, 8 months, 2 weeks, 1 day, 17 hours, 46 minutes, and 40 seconds.

Does this allow for leap years? — Arthur Rubin (talk) 09:28, 14 May 2019 (UTC)Reply

I am guessing not because the number of leap days will vary over the duration. Years, months and weeks should ideally be converted into weeks. That would still give readers a sense of time. Betty Logan (talk) 11:09, 14 May 2019 (UTC)Reply

Question edit

Is a trillion page here? Tinkerbell72311 (talk) 13:21, 26 October 2020 (UTC)Reply

The "trillion" pages are at Trillion, depending on which trillion you want. Betty Logan (talk) 15:12, 28 October 2020 (UTC)Reply

Can edit

What do you call 1,000,000,000🤔🤨 2402:4000:20C1:D04D:80FA:B4A5:9D54:9560 (talk) 05:45, 23 January 2022 (UTC)Reply

Usually, a billion. Please see the first sentence of the article for other terms. Certes (talk) 10:26, 23 January 2022 (UTC)Reply
See Long and short scales. Dhrm77 (talk) 15:55, 13 June 2023 (UTC)Reply

1,023,456,789 edit

1,023,456,789 is not the smallest number without repeating digits. That would be -9876543210. If we only count whole numbers, it's 0. Should that entry be changed? Qwerty3521 -- Message me here 21:51, 9 June 2022 (UTC)Reply

@Qwerty3521: Good point. I've clarified it. I think "smaller" means "closest to zero" here. –1,023,456,789 is equally small, but I think it's implied that we only consider positive integers. Certes (talk) 22:38, 9 June 2022 (UTC)Reply

1,000 = 10^3 = 1 million 1000,000 = 10^6 = 1 billion 115.98.232.13 (talk) 17:23, 13 March 2024 (UTC)Reply

1,000,000,000 = 10^9 = 1 trillion 115.98.232.13 (talk) 17:24, 13 March 2024 (UTC)Reply

10^6 = 1 billion edit

Tell me more about: 1,000 = 10^3 units = 1 million 1,000,000 = 10^6 units = 1 billion 1,000,000,000 = 10^9 units = 1 trillion 1,000,000,000,000 = 10^12 units = 1 quadrillion 1,000,000,000,000,000 = 10^15 units = 1 quintillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 = 10^18 units = 1 hexillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 = 10^21 units = 1 septillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 = 10^24 units = 1 octillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000= 10^27 units = 1 nonillion or 1 nanillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, 000 = 10^30 units = 1 zillion 115.98.232.13 (talk) 18:11, 13 March 2024 (UTC)Reply

10^3=thousand 10^6=million 10^9=billion 10^12=trillion 10^15=quadrillion 10^18=quintillion 10^21=sextillion 10^24=septillion 10^27=octillion 10^30=nonillion 10^33=decillion Semen2 (talk) 16:15, 21 March 2024 (UTC)Reply
Actually, it depends where you are located. See Long and short scales. Dhrm77 (talk) 16:53, 21 March 2024 (UTC)Reply

Move discussion in progress edit

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:300 (number) which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 19:18, 14 April 2024 (UTC)Reply