Data Transfer Rate Unit Converter

Formula or method

Output = input × source rate factor ÷ destination rate factor, through bit/s. One B/s = 8 bit/s and one MB/s = 8,000,000 bit/s. kb/s, Mb/s and Gb/s use decimal factors of 1,000, 1,000,000 and 1,000,000,000.

How to use this calculator

1. Enter the Value to convert. The interface starts with 1; replace it with your measurement or quantity. Blank, nonnumeric and out-of-range values cannot produce a result.
2. Select From unit for the source unit. Match the complete label, including square/cubic units, decimal/binary prefixes or the gallon system when applicable.
3. Select To unit for the destination unit, then read Converted value with its unit label.
4. Try the worked example with its stated source and destination units. Results show at most eight fractional digits; very small nonzero values use scientific notation. Check the page limitations before interpreting the output.

Worked example

Select megabit per second (Mb/s) → megabyte per second (MB/s), then enter 100. Compute 100,000,000 ÷ 8,000,000 = 12.5 MB/s. An input of 1 B/s gives 8 bit/s.

Understanding the result

A 100 Mb/s nominal rate is 12.5 MB/s before overhead. This is a change of units, not a measured speed test or a promised download throughput.

Limitations and assumptions

• Use a nonnegative rate. These prefixes are decimal; binary MiB/s is not offered.
• Protocol overhead, congestion, latency, server limits and file sizes are not modeled. No download-time estimate or network performance guarantee is provided.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

• NIST: binary prefixes, decimal prefixes, and bits versus bytes