Kilo (symbol: k) is a prefix in the SI system denoting 103 or 1,000. For example:
Adopted in 1795, it comes from the Greek χίλιοι, meaning thousand.
"Kilo" is often used by itself as an abbreviation for "kilogram". Also, technical people often use the term "k", pronounced like the letter, to refer to a thousand of something, especially units of money or population. The kilometre, on the other hand, is often abbreviated to "klick" in American, especially military usage.
Kilo is also the letter K in the NATO phonetic alphabet
1 Use in computing
In computing, kilo does not always exactly denote 1000 but is usually equivalent to 1024 (210), most often when denoting storage. For example, a kilobyte is 1024 byteThis article refers to the unit of binary information. Byte was also the name of a popular computer industry magazine, see Byte magazine. A byte is commonly used as a unit of storage measurement in computers, regardless of the type of data being stored.s, not 1000 bytes. One prominent exception is the field of commodity hard drive manufacturing, where the smaller value is used in advertising and technical specifications. Additionally, kilo and megaMega (symbol M is a SI prefix in the SI system of units denoting a factor of 106, i. one million; 1 000 000. Confirmed in 1960, it comes from the Greek , meaning great''. For example, 1 MW (megawatt) 1 000 000 watts 1 000 kilowatts. Other common examples often have their traditional SI meanings when referring to rates of data transfer. For instance, 56 kilo bitThis article is about the unit of information, see Bit (disambiguation) for other meanings. A bit (abbreviated b is the most basic information unit used in computing and information theory. A single bit (short for b inary dig it is a zero or a one, or a ts per secondThis article is about the unit of time. See second (disambiguation) for other uses The second (symbol s is a unit for time, and one of seven SI base units. It is defined as the duration of 9,192,631,770 periods of the radiation corresponding to the transi is 56,000 bits per second, not 57,344 bits per second.
A common (but erroneous) convention is to use k for 1000 and K for 1024. The prefix kibi for "1024" has been introduced, but has not gained much popularity.
