Millions to Quadrillions (M to quad)

1 million equals 1×10⁻⁹ quadrillions exactly.

1 million = 1×10⁻⁹ quadrillions

How to convert millions to quadrillions

To convert millions to quadrillions, multiply the number of millions by 1×10⁻⁹. This factor is exact. To go the other way, multiply quadrillions by 1,000,000,000.

quadrillions = millions × 1×10⁻⁹

Example: 10 millions = 1×10⁻⁸ quadrillions.

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

Million (M)

General & non-SICurrent unit

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)

Quadrillion (quad)

General & non-SICurrent unit

10¹⁵ in the short scale.

Quadrillion is 10¹⁵, a thousand trillion, on the short scale, and it is a number most people meet only through energy statistics. The U.S. Energy Information Administration defines a quad as a quadrillion British thermal units and notes that national energy use typically reaches quadrillions of Btu. Its examples include 35.43 quads from petroleum, 33.61 from natural gas, and 8.17 from coal.

The name uses the Latin quadri-, four. It appears among the terms in Nicolas Chuquet's unpublished manuscript of 1484, alongside byllion and tryllion. On the long scale the same 10¹⁵ is called a billiard, and a quadrillion means 10²⁴. The SI prefix for 10¹⁵ is peta-. A quadrillion seconds is about 31.7 million years.

1 quadrillion = 1×10¹⁵ pieces (exactly).

Sources: U.S. EIA: British thermal units (Btu); Wikipedia: Names of large numbers; BIPM SI Brochure, 9th edition (2019)

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