Math Tools New Tool

Free Online Scientific Notation Converter With E Notation

Convert a number between plain decimal, scientific notation, engineering notation and the E notation that calculators use. Significant figures are counted from the digits you actually typed, so a trailing zero that was measured is kept rather than discarded, and very large and very small numbers are written out in full.

Free Forever Nothing Uploaded Four Forms At Once Figures Counted Properly

Free Online Scientific Notation Converter With E Notation

Advertisement Slot (Top Banner) Google AdSense Unit • Responsive Banner

🔬 Scientific Notation Decimal, scientific, engineering and E notation · significant figures counted

The sum runs in your browser. Nothing you type is sent anywhere.

🔬 The number

Type it in any form: plain decimal, scientific with a times ten, or the E notation a calculator produces. All four forms come out together.

The number 0.000123, 1.23e-4 and 1.23 x 10^-4 are all read the same way.

Round to this many significant figures Leave it at 0 to keep every figure you typed.

Try one of these

The fourth has a trailing zero that counts, which is the thing most converters quietly throw away.

Scientific notation

—

E notation—

Engineering notation—

Written out in full—

Significant figures—

Order of magnitude—

Recent conversions, kept in this browser only.

Nothing here yet Press Log to history on the Convert tab to keep one here.

Buy Us A Coffee

Enjoying WizTools123? Help keep our server infrastructure 100% free and open for everyone.

Buy Us A Coffee

Sponsored Content (Below Tool) Google AdSense Placement

How to Write Scientific Notation

Three steps, and the third is about precision.

Type the number in whatever form you have it Plain decimal, scientific with a times ten to a power, or the E notation a calculator shows. All three are read the same way.

Read all four forms Scientific, E notation, engineering notation and the number written out in full, including very large and very small ones that a browser would otherwise refuse to spell out.

Check the significant figures They are counted from the digits you typed rather than from the value, so a trailing zero that represents a measurement is kept. You can also round to a chosen number of figures.

What to Know About Scientific Notation

Significant figures, engineering form and what the E means.

A trailing zero can be a significant figure. The numbers 1.5 and 1.50 have the same value and different meanings: the second claims to be measured one digit more precisely. Counting significant figures from the value rather than from what was written loses that distinction entirely, which matters in any laboratory or engineering context. This page counts from the digits you typed, so 1.50e3 is reported as three significant figures and 1.5e3 as two.

Engineering notation is not the same as scientific. Scientific notation puts exactly one digit before the point, so the power can be anything. Engineering notation restricts the power to multiples of three, so the number lines up with the prefixes people actually use: kilo, mega, giga, milli, micro, nano. A value of 0.000123 is 1.23 times ten to the minus four in scientific form and 123 times ten to the minus six in engineering form, which reads directly as 123 microunits.

A browser will not write out very large or very small numbers. Asking JavaScript to turn ten to the twenty first into text gives back E notation again, and the same happens below about a ten millionth. Since writing the number out in full is one of the things this page is for, the plain form is built digit by digit from the parts rather than asked for, which is why it works at any size.

The E is just shorthand for times ten to the power. It came from calculators and programming languages, where superscripts could not be displayed, and it means exactly the same thing. 6.022e23 and 6.022 times ten to the twenty third are the same number written two ways. The letter has nothing to do with the mathematical constant e.

The order of magnitude is the exponent. It is how many powers of ten the number spans, and it is what lets two quantities be compared at a glance. Something of order ten to the sixth is a million times larger than something of order one, whatever the digits in front say. Comparing orders first and digits second is how scientists avoid losing track of scale.

It runs in your browser with nothing uploaded. The conversion is in the page, so it works offline once loaded and nothing you type is sent anywhere.

Key Features & Capabilities

What it does, and what it deliberately does not.

Four forms at once Scientific, E notation, engineering notation and the number written out in full.

Significant figures from your digits Counted from what you typed, so a measured trailing zero is kept rather than discarded.

Engineering notation included Powers restricted to multiples of three, so the number reads as kilo, milli, micro and so on.

Full form at any size Built digit by digit, so it works where a browser gives back E notation instead.

Rounding to a chosen precision Any number of significant figures, with the result shown in all four forms.

Nothing is uploaded It runs in this tab and keeps working offline.

About Scientific Notation

Scientific notation writes a number as a single digit, a decimal part, and a power of ten. It exists because the alternative is unreadable: the speed of light as 299792458 metres per second is a row of digits nobody can take in, while 2.99792458 times ten to the eighth says immediately that it is around three hundred million. The power is the order of magnitude, and comparing two numbers by their powers first is how anyone working with a wide range of scales keeps track of them.

E notation is the same thing adapted for keyboards. Calculators and programming languages could not display a superscript, so 6.022e23 came to mean 6.022 times ten to the twenty third. The letter is purely a separator and has nothing to do with the mathematical constant e, which is an unfortunate collision but a harmless one in practice.

Engineering notation is a third form and a genuinely different one. It allows one, two or three digits before the point and requires the exponent to be a multiple of three, so that it matches the unit prefixes: kilo at ten to the third, mega at the sixth, giga at the ninth, and milli, micro and nano going the other way. A capacitor of 0.000000047 farads is 4.7 times ten to the minus eight in scientific notation, which tells you little, and 47 times ten to the minus nine in engineering notation, which reads straight off as 47 nanofarads.

The part that most converters get wrong is significant figures. The value 1.5 and the value 1.50 are numerically identical and scientifically different: the second asserts that the measurement was good to one more digit. If figures are counted by looking at the number, that trailing zero disappears and the claim about precision with it. So the count here is made from the characters you typed, which is the only way to preserve the distinction, and a trailing zero after the decimal point is counted as significant.

One practical note about writing numbers out in full. A browser refuses to do it past about ten to the twenty first, and below about a ten millionth, handing back E notation instead. Since the full form is one of the four outputs here, it is assembled from the digits and the exponent directly rather than being requested, which means it works at any magnitude the page accepts.

Frequently Asked Questions

Forms, figures, trailing zeros and very small numbers.

Scientific notation has exactly one digit before the point and any exponent. Engineering notation allows up to three digits before the point and restricts the exponent to multiples of three, so it lines up with prefixes like kilo, milli and nano.

Times ten to the power. It is keyboard shorthand from calculators and programming languages, and it has nothing to do with the mathematical constant e.

Because the trailing zero was written, and a written trailing zero after the decimal point is a claim about precision. 1.5e3 has two. Both equal 1500, but they assert different levels of measurement accuracy.

Yes. Plain decimal, E notation and the times ten to the power form are all read the same way, so you can convert in any direction.

Because JavaScript switches to E notation above about ten to the twenty first and below about a ten millionth. This page builds the full form from the digits itself, so it works at any size.

It keeps that many digits counting from the first non zero one, and rounds the rest. Three significant figures of 0.00012345 is 0.000123; the leading zeros are placeholders and are not counted.

No. The conversion runs in your browser, so nothing you type leaves the page and it works offline.