googol

American  

[goo-gawl, -gol, -guhl] / ˈgu gɔl, -gɒl, -gəl /

noun

1. a number that is equal to 1 followed by 100 zeros and expressed as 10 100 .

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googol British  

/ ˈɡuːɡɒl, -ɡəl /

noun

1. the number represented as one followed by 100 zeros (10 ¹⁰⁰ )

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googol Scientific  

/ go̅o̅′gôl′,go̅o̅′gəl /

1. The number 10 raised to the 100th power (10 ¹⁰⁰), written out as 1 followed by 100 zeros.

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Etymology

Origin of googol

First recorded in 1935–40; introduced by U.S. mathematician Edward Kasner (1878–1955), whose nine-year-old nephew allegedly invented it

Explanation

A googol is a famously huge number, literally ten to the one hundredth power. A math teacher might offer extra credit to students who correctly write out the digits of a googol on the blackboard. If you want to write out a googol, write the number one followed by one hundred zeros. Mathematicians sometimes use the idea of a googol to illustrate the difference between an enormous number — one that's too large to imagine — and infinity. The word googol was invented by the young nephew of mathematician Edward Kasner, one of the authors of the 1940 book "Mathematics and the Imagination."

Example Sentences

A googolplex—1 followed by a googol of zeroes—is recognized by Guinness World Records as the largest finite, widely accepted, named number.

From The Wall Street Journal • May 29, 2026

A googol is 10 to the 100th power.

From Scientific American • Jun. 16, 2021

Of Google, she says it can be an “an empty vessel who don’t know what a googol is.”

From Forbes • Oct. 14, 2013

Science with humanity is googol times more amazing.

From New York Times • Sep. 2, 2013

And yet these numbers, the googol and the googolplex, do not approach, they come nowhere near, the idea of infinity.

From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan

Related Words

• figure
• statistic
• sum
• total