About the Data Storage Converter
Digital storage is counted in two different ways. Drive makers and many networks use decimal units, where a kilobyte is 1,000 bytes and a gigabyte is 1,000 million bytes. Operating systems and memory use binary units, where a kibibyte is 1,024 bytes and a gibibyte is 1,073,741,824 bytes. This converter handles both sets, from single bits up to petabytes and pebibytes, and shows your value in every unit at once. It also explains the gap that confuses so many buyers: a drive sold as 512 GB shows up as roughly 477 GiB on a computer that counts in 1,024s.
Updated October 2026
How to use the Data Storage Converter
- 1Type the amount of data you have.
- 2Choose its unit from the list.
- 3Read the value in every other decimal and binary unit.
- 4Check the extra line that shows decimal gigabytes as binary ones.
- 5Copy the line for your notes.
The 1,000 versus 1,024 gap
The difference between 1,000 and 1,024 looks small, but it compounds with each step. At kilobytes it is 2.4 percent, at gigabytes 7.4 percent and at terabytes about 10 percent. That is why a big drive seems to lose more space than a small one. The converter shows the exact figures so you can see for yourself.
A worked example makes the gap clear. A 256 GB phone holds 256,000,000,000 bytes. Divided by 1,073,741,824 that is 238.4 GiB, and the phone's operating system also reserves several gigabytes for itself, so the free space you see on a new device is lower again. Cloud plans, camera cards and USB sticks are sold in decimal gigabytes, while RAM is built and described in binary units, so a 16 GB memory module really holds 16 GiB. Knowing which system a figure uses saves arguments with sales staff and avoids buying too little space.
Typical sizes
- A plain text email: around 2 KB.
- A smartphone photo: 2 to 6 MB.
- An MP3 song: 3 to 8 MB.
- An HD movie: 1.5 to 5 GB.
- A modern game install: 30 to 150 GB.
Related tools
Use the Bandwidth Calculator to work out download time from file size and connection speed, the Compress Image and Compress PDF tools to shrink files, and the Unit Converter and Number Base Converter for other conversions. The Image to Base64 tool shows how much extra space encoding adds.
Features
- Bits, bytes and decimal units up to petabytes
- Binary units KiB, MiB, GiB, TiB and PiB
- Every result at once
- Shows what a drive will report on your computer
- Large numbers kept exact
- Works in your browser
Frequently asked questions
How many MB are in a GB?
In decimal units, which hard drive and phone makers use, 1 GB is 1,000 MB. In binary units, 1 GiB is 1,024 MiB. Many systems show binary amounts but label them GB, which is where the confusion comes from.
Why does my 1 TB drive show less than 1 TB?
A 1 TB drive holds 1,000,000,000,000 bytes. A system that counts in 1,024s divides that by 1,099,511,627,776 and reports about 931 GiB. Nothing is missing; the unit is just bigger. File system overhead takes a little more.
What is the difference between MB and Mb?
A capital B means bytes and a small b means bits. Eight bits make a byte. Internet speeds are quoted in megabits per second, so a 100 Mbps connection downloads at most about 12.5 megabytes per second.
What are KiB, MiB and GiB?
They are the IEC names for binary units: 1 KiB is 1,024 bytes, 1 MiB is 1,024 KiB and so on. They were introduced so that KB, MB and GB could mean the decimal values without ambiguity.
How much is a petabyte?
A petabyte is 1,000 terabytes, or a million gigabytes. It would hold roughly 250 million photos or 500 billion pages of text. The binary version, a pebibyte, is about 12.6 percent larger.
Which should I use, KB or KiB?
Use KB for decimal quantities, such as storage sold by a manufacturer, and KiB when you mean exactly 1,024 bytes, such as memory pages. If in doubt, state which you mean to avoid mistakes.