31/12/2018 How Many Zeros Are in a Million, Billion, and Trillion
Science, Tech, Math › Math
Numbers of Zeros in a Million, Billion,
Trillion, and More
Learn How Many Zeros Are in All Numbers, Even Googol
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ThoughtCo
by Anne Marie Helmenstine
Updated March 21, 2018
If you have ever wondered what number comes after a trillion, read on. For example, do you
know how many zeros there are in a vigintillion? Someday you may need to know this for
science or math class. Then again, you might just want to impress a friend or teacher.
Numbers Bigger Than a Trillion
The digit zero plays a very important role as you count very large numbers. It helps track
these multiples of 10 because the larger the number is, the more zeroes are needed.
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31/12/2018 How Many Zeros Are in a Million, Billion, and Trillion
In the below table, the first column lists the name of the number, the second provides the
number of zeros that follow the initial digit, while the third tells you how many groups of
three zeros you would need to write out each number.
Name Number of Zeros Groups of (3) Zeros
Ten 1 (10)
Hundred 2 (100)
Thousand 3 1 (1,000)
Ten thousand 4 (10,000)
Hundred thousand 5 (100,000)
Million 6 2 (1,000,000)
Billion 9 3 (1,000,000,000)
Trillion 12 4 (1,000,000,000,000)
Quadrillion 15 5
Quintillion 18 6
Sextillion 21 7
Septillion 24 8
Octillion 27 9
Nonillion 30 10
Decillion 33 11
Undecillion 36 12
Duodecillion 39 13
Tredecillion 42 14
Quatttuor-decillion 45 15
Quindecillion 48 16
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31/12/2018 How Many Zeros Are in a Million, Billion, and Trillion
Name Number of Zeros Groups of (3) Zeros
Sexdecillion 51 17
Septen-decillion 54 18
Octodecillion 57 19
Novemdecillion 60 20
Vigintillion 63 21
Centillion 303 101
All of Those Zeros
A table, as the one above, can certainly be helpful in listing the names of all of the
subsequent numbers depending on how many zeros they have. But it can be really mind-
boggling to see just what some of those numbers look like.
Below is a listing, including all of the zeros, for the numbers up to decillion. For comparison,
that's a little more than half the numbers listed in the above table.
Ten: 10 (1 zero)
Hundred: 100 (2 zeros)
Thousand: 1000 (3 zeros)
Ten thousand 10,000 (4 zeros)
Hundred thousand 100,000 (5 zeros)
Million 1,000,000 (6 zeros)
Billion 1,000,000,000 (9 zeros)
Trillion 1,000,000,000,000 (12 zeros)
Quadrillion 1,000,000,000,000,000 (15 zeros)
Quintillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 (18 zeros)
Sextillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (21 zeros)
Septillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (24 zeros)
Octillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (27 zeros)
Nonillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (30 zeros)
Decillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (33 zeros)
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Zeros Grouped in Sets of Three
Except for relatively small numbers, names for sets of zeros is reserved for groupings of three
zeros. You write numbers with commas separating sets of three zeros so that it's easier to
read and understand the value. For example, you write one million as 1,000,000 rather than
1000000.
As another example, it's much easier to remember that a trillion is written with four sets of
three zeros than it is to count out 12 separate zeroes. While you might think that one's pretty
simple, just wait until you have to count 27 zeros for an octillion or 303 zeros for a centillion.
It is then that you will be thankful that you only have to remember nine and 101 sets of three
zeros, respectively.
Numbers With Very Large Numbers of Zeros
The number googol (termed by Milton Sirotta) has 100 zeros after it. Sirotta came up with
the name for the number when he was just 9 years old. Here's what the number looks like,
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31/12/2018 How Many Zeros Are in a Million, Billion, and Trillion
including all of its required zeros:
10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,0
Do you think that number is big? How about the googolplex, which is a 1 followed by a
googol of zeros.
The googolplex is so large it doesn't have any meaningful use yet. The number is larger than
the number of atoms in the universe.
MILLION AND BILLION: AMERICAN vs. BRITISH
In the United States, as well as around the world in science and finance, a billion is 1,000
million, which is written as a 1 followed by 9 zeros.
This is also called the "short scale."
There is also a "long scale," which is used in France and previously was used in the United
Kingdom, in which a billion means 1 million million. According to this definition of a billion,
the number is written with a 1 followed by 12 zeros. The short scale and long scale were
described by French mathematician Genevieve Guitel in 1975.
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