Skip to main content
megabit

megabit

2 3.7
A measure of digital data equal to one million bits that shows how fast data moves online
  • noun
  • /ˈmɛɡəˌbɪt/
  • Specialized
translation icon : megabit
  • With technological advances, the company will eventually be able to offer 90 percent of its U-Verse territory speeds of 75 megabits per second, while 75 percent will get speeds of 100 megabits per second.
  • megabits per second

Examples

  • Weiser is far less concerned about how slow, expensive, and unreliable the basic broadband service currently available to American households (1–3 megabits per second) is.

    Academic text (2005)
  • Most modern internet connections offer speeds of over 100 megabits per second.

  • Even an 8-page per minute laser printer requires a data rate of about 1 megabit per second.

    Academic text (1992)
  • It will provide a data rate from Mars of more than 2 megabits per second.

    Academic text (2004)
  • And of those 60%, only a minority of them actually get download speeds as high as 4 megabits per second, the minimum required speed for actual broadband as defined by the FCC.

    Blog text (33)
  • In fact, users are being offered Internet speeds that sit somewhere between 8 and 12 Megabits per second (Mbps), which is more than some homeowners receive on a standard broadband connection.

    Blog text (13)
  • There are now thousands of WiFi hotspots capable of sustaining data transfer at 11 megabits per second and more that deliver only 1 megabit or so because they are limited by the capacity of the DSL line serving them.

    Academic text (2005)
  • The test showed that the network could handle up to 50 megabits without issues.

  • For online gaming, a stable connection of at least 25 megabits is recommended.

Synonyms

Mb
vsmegabit
  • Specialized
2 3.8

A measure of information equal to one million bits

is used mainly for measuring transfer rates rather than file size
Mbit
vsmegabit
  • Specialized
1 4.5

A unit of information equal to one million bits used to measure data speed

is the spelled out form rather than the short abbreviation

How Much

terabit
  • Specialized
1 5.1
gigabit
  • Specialized
3 4.0
megabit
  • Specialized
2 3.7
kilobit
  • Specialized
1 4.8

Surface Forms

megabit singular
megabits plural

Morphology

megabit = bit (semi-transparent) = mega + bit

The word is built regularly from the metric prefix 'mega-' plus 'bit', but the technical unit meaning may not be fully predictable for an average learner.

Etymology

Megabit is made of two clear parts: mega- meaning 'a million' (as in megabyte) and bit meaning 'binary digit', the smallest piece of digital information. So a megabit is one million bits, which is why people use it to talk about data speed or file size.