Billions (long Scale) to Millions (billion to M)
1 billion (long scale) equals 1,000,000 millions exactly.
How to convert billions (long scale) to millions
To convert billions (long scale) to millions, multiply the number of billions (long scale) by 1,000,000. This factor is exact. To go the other way, multiply millions by 0.000001.
millions = billions (long scale) × 1,000,000
Example: 10 billions (long scale) = 10,000,000 millions.
Large-number names differ around the world: this site uses the short scale (billion = 10⁹) by default, and lists the long-scale billion separately.
About these units
Billion (long Scale) (billion)
One million million (10¹²). The traditional British meaning, still used in much of continental Europe (e.g. German Billion). UK government usage switched to the short scale in 1974.
The long-scale billion is the older meaning, a million million, 10¹². The word was formed from million with the prefix bi-, so it named the second power of a million. The Oxford English Dictionary dates it to the 16th century, and French writers had already used bymillion in 1475 and byllion in 1484. On the long scale each new name is a million times the last: million, billion, trillion at 10¹⁸, with the 10¹⁵ step called a billiard.
Britain used this sense as its most common one until the 1950s, when the short scale began spreading through technical writing and journalism, and the government formally adopted the short scale in 1974. France reverted to the long scale in 1948. Today the long scale is used in continental Europe, French Canada, and the Spanish-speaking Americas, so the same word can mean either 10¹² or 10⁹ depending on the language, and a long-scale billion is 1,000 short-scale billions.
1 billion (long scale) = 1,000,000,000,000 pieces (exactly).
Sources: Wikipedia: Long and short scales; Wikipedia: Billion; Hansard, 20 Dec 1974: Billion (Definition), written answer
Million (M)
One million (10⁶).
Million comes from Italian. Old Italian milione was built from mille, a thousand, plus an augmentative ending, so it began as something like a big thousand. The name proved useful as a stem: by 1475 the French mathematician Jehan Adam was already building larger names from it, bymillion and trimillion, for 10¹² and 10¹⁸. The short and long scales agree on the million itself, 1,000,000 or 10⁶, and diverge only for the larger names. The SI prefix mega- stands for 10⁶.
Millions are hard to feel. Counting out a million items one by one is famously laborious, yet a million seconds lasts only about 11.57 days. A billion seconds, by contrast, is roughly 31.7 years.
1 million = 1,000,000 pieces (exactly).
Sources: Wikipedia: Million; Wikipedia: Names of large numbers; BIPM SI Brochure, 9th edition (2019)
Related conversions
- Millions to billions (long scale) (reverse)
- Billions (long scale) to pieces
- Billions (long scale) to dozens
- Billions (long scale) to lakhs
- Billions (long scale) to crores
- Billions (long scale) to billions (short scale)
- Pieces to millions
- Dozens to millions
- Lakhs to millions
- Crores to millions
- Billions (short scale) to millions
- Pairs to millions
- Hundred to millions
- Gross to millions
- Thousand to millions
- Trillions (short scale) to millions
- Score to millions
- Half dozens to millions
See all counting & quantity units.