quintillion

[kwin-til-yuhn]

noun

plural

quintillions ,

plural

quintillion .

1. a cardinal number represented in the U.S. by 1 followed by 18 zeros, and in Great Britain by 1 followed by 30 zeros.

adjective

1. amounting to one quintillion in number.

quintillion

/ kwɪnˈtɪljən /

noun

1. US and Canadian word: nonillion. (in Britain, France, and Germany) the number represented as one followed by 30 zeros (10 ³⁰ )

2. Former Brit word: trillion. (in the US and Canada) the number represented as one followed by 18 zeros (10 ¹⁸ )

Other Word Forms

• quintillionth noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of quintillion¹

1665–75; < Latin quīnt ( us ) fifth + -illion (as in million )

Word History and Origins

Origin of quintillion¹

C17: from Latin quintus fifth + -illion, as in _million

Example Sentences

Interplanetary space contains just a few dozen particles in each cubic centimeter — in comparison, the air we breathe has tens of quintillions of molecules per cubic centimeter.

Read more on Salon

They expect future calculations to be performed on ORNL's Frontier, the world's most powerful supercomputer and the first exascale system, which is able to perform more than a quintillion calculations each second.

Read more on Science Daily

There are more than 10 quintillion insects on Earth, 200 million for every human.

Read more on Science Magazine

"The right answer emerges every 10 minutes, and the rest of the data, quintillions of them, are computations that serve no further purpose and are therefore immediately discarded," de Vries says.

Read more on Science Daily

"All of these machines combined are generating 500 quintillion guesses every second of the day, non stop - that is 500 with 18 zeros behind it."

Read more on BBC