Glossary · Phase 0 · Tools
Order of magnitude
A power of ten. Two numbers three orders of magnitude apart differ by a factor of about 1,000.
When two numbers are far apart, the useful question is often "how many powers of ten apart?" That count is the order of magnitude. A thousand (10³) and a million (10⁶) are three orders of magnitude apart. A model with 7 × 10⁹ parameters and one with 7 × 10¹¹ are two apart: one is a hundred times bigger than the other.
Try it now
Each step doubles the last. Slide n and watch how quickly the numbers run away.
Learn it properly
Powers, roots and powers of ten · Repeated multiplication, e-notation like 3e-4, square roots and doubling. About 20 minutes.
Other terms from the same lesson
- e-notation: A way to write very big or very small numbers with a power of ten: 3e-4 means 3 × 10⁻⁴, which is 0.0003.
- exponent: The small raised number in a power, saying how many times to multiply: in 2⁵, the exponent 5 means 2 × 2 × 2 × 2 × 2.
- square root: The number that, multiplied by itself, gives the one you started with. The square root of 25 is 5.
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