Ream (rm)
500 sheets of paper (20 quires), the standard retail package for printer paper. A short ream of 480 sheets survives for some specialty papers.
1 ream = 500 pieces (exactly).
About the ream
Ream comes from the Arabic rizmah, a bundle of paper, passing through Spanish resma and Old French reyme; the Moors introduced cotton papermaking to Spain. Its size has varied. The modern standard, 500 sheets or 20 quires of 25, is the ISO and DIN definition and what retail paper almost always means. A short ream of 480 sheets, 20 quires of 24, was formerly the British standard and survives for tissue, greaseproof, handmade, and blotting papers. J. S. Bach's Weimar manuscript paper was ordered by the 480-sheet ream.
Other versions include the 516-sheet printer's or perfect ream, the 504-sheet envelope-paper ream, and the 472-sheet mill ream for handmade paper, which was 18 quires of 24 good sheets plus two 20-sheet quires of damaged ones. In 1922 the UK set machine-made writing and printing paper at 500 sheets. ISO 4046-3:2002 defines a ream as a pack of 500 identical sheets and recommends another term, such as pack, for other counts.
Sources: Wikipedia: Units of paper quantity
Ream conversion chart
1 ream expressed in every other counting & quantity unit:
| Unit | 1 ream |
|---|---|
| Pieces | 500 |
| Dozens | 41.66666667 |
| Lakhs | 0.005 |
| Millions | 0.0005 |
| Crores | 0.00005 |
| Billions (short Scale) | 5×10⁻⁷ |
| Pairs | 250 |
| Hundred | 5 |
| Gross | 3.472222222 |
| Thousand | 0.5 |
| Trillions (short Scale) | 5×10⁻¹⁰ |
| Score | 25 |
| Half Dozens | 83.33333333 |
| Quadrillions | 5×10⁻¹³ |
| Moles | 8.302695336×10⁻²² |
| Baker's Dozens | 38.46153846 |
| Small Gross | 4.166666667 |
| Great Gross | 0.2893518519 |
| Myriads | 0.05 |
| Yi / Oku | 0.000005 |
| Arab (Indian) | 5×10⁻⁷ |
| Kharab (Indian) | 5×10⁻⁹ |
| Billions (long Scale) | 5×10⁻¹⁰ |
| Quires | 20 |
More US & Imperial units
- dozen (counting & quantity)
- half dozen (counting & quantity)
- gross (counting & quantity)
- great gross (counting & quantity)
- quire (counting & quantity)
- inch (length)
- foot (length)
- yard (length)
- mile (length)
- thou (length)
- league (length)
- furlong (length)
- chain (length)
- rod (length)
- link (length)
- hand (length)
Browse all counting & quantity units.