In 1995, the National Institute of Standards & Technology defined a new standard of measurement that accurately reflects the difference between decimal and binary numbers. The traditional kilo, mega, giga, etc. designations were changed to kibi, mebi, gibi and so on (see table below) when referring to true binary numbers.
For example, one million bytes would be expressed as one "megabyte" (MB) for the decimal number 1,000,000 (106), but one "mebibyte" (MiB) for the binary number 1,048,576 (220).
Will It Catch On?
After more than a decade, NIST measurements have not become mainstream, but are used when absolute precision is required. See binary values.
Decimal Binary
kilobit (Kb) kibibit (Kib) Kilo bInary bit
megabit (Mb) mebibit (Mib) Mega bInary bit
gigabit (Gb) gibibit (Gib) Giga bInary bit
terabit (Tb) tebibit (Tib) Tera bInary bit
petabit (Tb) pebibit (Pib) Peta bInary bit
exabit (Eb) exbibit (Eib) Exa bInary bit
zettabit (Zb) zebibit (Zib) Zetta bInary bit
yottabit (Yb) yobibit (Yib) Yotta bInary bit
kilobyte (KB) kibibyte (KiB) Kilo bInary Byte
megabyte (MB) mebibyte (MiB) Mega bInary Byte
gigabyte (GB) gibibyte (GiB) Giga bInary Byte
terabyte (TB) tebibyte (TiB) Tera bInary Byte
petabyte (TB) pebibyte (PiB) Peta bInary Byte
exabyte (EB) exbibyte (EiB) Exa bInary Byte
zettabyte (ZB) zebibyte (ZiB) Zetta bInary Byte
yottabyte (YB) yobibyte (YiB) Yotta bInary Byte
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