Gigabytes to Megabits (GB to Mb)
1 gigabyte equals 8,000 megabits exactly.
How to convert gigabytes to megabits
To convert gigabytes to megabits, multiply the number of gigabytes by 8,000. This factor is exact. To go the other way, multiply megabits by 0.000125.
megabits = gigabytes × 8,000
Example: 10 gigabytes = 80,000 megabits.
Decimal prefixes (kB, MB, GB) are powers of 1,000; binary prefixes (KiB, MiB, GiB) are powers of 1,024. Storage makers use decimal; Windows reports binary but labels it GB.
About these units
Gigabyte (GB)
1,000,000,000 bytes (decimal). Storage manufacturers and phone makers use this definition.
The gigabyte is where the decimal-versus-binary dispute turned into lawsuits. Drive makers advertise capacity in decimal units, so a 500 GB drive holds 500 billion bytes, but Windows reports sizes in binary units and shows about 465.7 of what it labels GB for the same drive. Early challenges against Western Digital and Seagate were settled, with Western Digital adding disclaimers that usable capacity may differ from the advertised figure.
A 2019 lawsuit was decided in the manufacturers' favor, with the court relying on the decimal definition. For scale, one gigabyte holds roughly an hour of standard-definition video at 2.2 Mbit/s. A single-layer DVD+R holds about 4.7 GB and a single-layer Blu-ray about 25 GB. RAM is still often sized in binary gigabytes, which the IEC would call gibibytes.
1 gigabyte = 1,000,000,000 bytes (exactly).
Sources: Wikipedia: Gigabyte; Wikipedia: Binary prefix; Wikipedia: Gibibyte
Megabit (Mb)
1,000,000 bits (125,000 bytes). Internet speeds are advertised in megabits per second.
Megabit is the unit behind most internet plans: speeds are quoted in megabits per second, while files are sized in megabytes. Since a byte is eight bits, a megabit is one eighth of a megabyte, which is 125,000 bytes in decimal units, and an advertised speed in Mbit/s therefore looks eight times larger than the same rate in megabytes per second. Data transfer rates are usually measured in decimal SI multiples.
Writing it is tricky. The IEC symbol is Mbit and the IEEE recommends Mb, but a capital M with lowercase b is easy to confuse with MB, the megabyte. The binary counterpart, the mebibit, is rarely used. Memory chips are sometimes sized in megabits too, so check which unit a spec sheet is using before comparing numbers.
1 megabit = 125,000 bytes (exactly).
Sources: Wikipedia: Bit; Wikipedia: Megabit
Related conversions
- Megabits to gigabytes (reverse)
- Gigabytes to bytes
- Gigabytes to kilobytes
- Gigabytes to megabytes
- Gigabytes to terabytes
- Gigabytes to bits
- Gigabytes to petabytes
- Gigabytes to kibibytes
- Gigabytes to mebibytes
- Gigabytes to gibibytes
- Gigabytes to tebibytes
- Gigabytes to kilobits
- Gigabytes to gigabits
- Bytes to megabits
- Kilobytes to megabits
- Megabytes to megabits
- Terabytes to megabits
- Bits to megabits
- Petabytes to megabits
- Kibibytes to megabits
- Mebibytes to megabits
- Gibibytes to megabits
- Tebibytes to megabits
- Kilobits to megabits
- Gigabits to megabits
See all digital storage units.