In this track: Digital value and units
Count a billion and a quintillion
Group the zeros before large Ethereum numbers become intimidating.
A thousand boxes, each holding a thousand marbles, contain a million marbles. Grouping counts makes huge numbers easier to reason about.
1 ETH = 1000000000 Gwei = 1000000000000000000 Wei.
Build in groups of three
One thousand is 10³, one million is 10⁶, and one billion is 10⁹. Every group of three zeros multiplies the number by a thousand. One quintillion in the short scale is 10¹⁸: six groups of three zeros.
Put units on the groups
One Gwei is a billion Wei. One ETH is a billion Gwei. Multiplying a billion by a billion gives a quintillion, so one ETH is 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 Wei. The two conversion factors multiply; they do not add.
Read the example slowly
The amount 1,500,000,000 Gwei is one and a half billion Gwei, which is 1.5 ETH. The same amount in Wei is 1,500,000,000,000,000,000. The number looks bigger because the measuring unit got smaller.
Check your intuition
In the converter, enter one ETH, then inspect the other units. A conversion should preserve value, not create more money. The digit grouping is for reading; remove commas when entering a raw integer into our tools.
A billion multiplied by a billion equals…
Add the exponents when multiplying powers of ten: 10⁹ × 10⁹ = 10¹⁸.
Original explanations by EtherTools. Examples are educational and source-linked; this site is independent of the Ethereum Foundation. Our approach.