Data Storage Converter
Convert between data storage units with decimal (SI) and binary (IEC) standards.
Overview
Digital storage units carry two incompatible definitions. Decimal SI prefixes make a kilobyte 1,000 bytes and a terabyte 10¹² bytes; binary prefixes make a kibibyte 1,024 bytes and a tebibyte 2⁴⁰. The gap widens with each step, from 2.4 percent at the kilo level to about 10 percent at tera.
All Conversions
| Unité | Valeur |
|---|---|
Common File Sizes
| Description | Typical Size |
|---|---|
| Photo (JPEG) | 5 MB |
| Song (MP3) | 4 MB |
| Movie (DVD) | 4.7 GB |
| Movie (Blu-ray) | 25 GB |
| Video Game (AAA) | 50 GB |
Click a row to load that size.
Decimal vs Binary
- Decimal (SI): 1 KB = 1,000 B — used by storage manufacturers
- Binary (IEC): 1 KiB = 1,024 B — used by operating systems
- A 1 TB drive shows as ~931 GiB in your OS
How to Use
-
1
Enter the value
Type the amount you want to convert into the Data Storage Converter.
-
2
Choose the units
Select the unit to convert from and the unit to convert to.
-
3
Read the converted value
The conversion updates instantly in your browser — no button, nothing sent to a server.
About
Drive manufacturers label capacity in decimal units while most operating systems report binary quantities under decimal names, which is why a drive sold as 1 TB displays as roughly 931 GB. No storage is missing; the two figures describe the same 1,000,000,000,000 bytes under different conventions.
The IEC standardised the kibi, mebi and gibi prefixes in 1998 to remove the ambiguity. Adoption has been partial — Linux tooling and macOS use them or their decimal equivalents consistently, while Windows continues to report binary values with decimal labels. Network throughput adds a further trap, being quoted in bits rather than bytes, so a 100 Mbps link transfers at most about 12.5 MB per second.