Metric Prefixes and SI Units

Contributors: JordanDee

Introduction

Metric Prefixes are incredibly useful for describing quantities of the International System of Units (SI) in a more succinct manner.

When exploring the world of electronics, these units of measurement are very important and allow people from all over the world to communicate and share their work and discoveries. Some common units used in electronics include voltage for electrical potential difference, ampere for electrical current, watts for power, farad for capacitance, henry's for inductance, and ohms for resistance.

This tutorial will not only go over some of the most commonly used units in electronics but will also teach you the metric prefixes that help describe all of these base units in quantities ranging from the insanely large to the incredibly small.

Suggested Reading

If you would like to know more about the components that use the units and prefixes described in this tutorial, check out some of these related tutorials.

You should also be familiar with binary in order to help you understand binary prefixes.