How big is that file, in things you have downloaded?
File sizes span fifteen orders of magnitude and are quoted in at least six different units. Here is one scale for all of them.
71% of CD
500 MB is bigger than 5 of the 11 references on this page.
Reference figures are measurements and are rounded; the unit conversion behind them is exact.
| Reference | Size | Yours ÷ theirs | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| text message | 0.00016 MB | 3,125,000× | |
| short email | 0.0025 MB | 200,000× | |
| web page | 2.3 MB | 217× | The median page in 2024 |
| phone photo | 4 MB | 125× | |
| MP3 song | 5 MB | 100× | |
| CD | 700 MB | 0.714× | |
| DVD | 4,700 MB | 0.106× | |
| 4K film | 15,000 MB | 1/30 | |
| phone storage | 128,000 MB | 1/256 | |
| laptop SSD | 1,000,000 MB | 1/2,000 | |
| external hard drive | 4,000,000 MB | 1/8,000 |
Worth knowing
- A single 4K film is bigger than every text message an average person sends in a lifetime.
- The whole text of English Wikipedia — about 24 GB — fits comfortably on a phone.
Frequently asked
How many photos fit in a gigabyte?
About 250 at 4 MB each, which is typical for a modern phone camera. RAW files from a proper camera are 25–50 MB, so more like 25.
Is a gigabyte 1 000 or 1 024 megabytes?
1 000. The 1 024 version is a gibibyte, GiB. Storage makers use GB and operating systems often display GiB, which is why a "1 TB" drive shows as 931 GB.