Scientific Notation Worksheets
Free printable scientific notation worksheets: write large and small numbers in scientific notation, and back in standard form. Answer key included.
Half the questions give a number in standard form and ask for it in scientific notation, and half go the other way. To write 45,200,000 in scientific notation, put the decimal point after the first digit, 4.52, and count how many places it moved: seven, so 45,200,000 = 4.52 × 10⁷.
Half the numbers are large, with exponents from 3 to 9, and half are small, with negative exponents from -2 to -7: 0.00072 is 7.2 × 10⁻⁴. Every coefficient is from 1 to 9.99, with up to three significant digits, and every answer is exact.
What this worksheet covers
- Write numbers in scientific notation
- Convert scientific notation to standard form
Frequently asked questions
What is scientific notation?
A way of writing a number as a number from 1 to just under 10, times a power of ten. 3,000,000 is 3 × 10⁶, and 0.005 is 5 × 10⁻³. It keeps very large and very small numbers short and easy to compare.
What does a negative exponent mean in scientific notation?
That the number is smaller than 1. 10⁻³ is one thousandth, so 2.6 × 10⁻³ is 0.0026: the decimal point moves three places to the left.
Why isn't 45 × 10⁶ in scientific notation?
Because the first number must be at least 1 and less than 10. 45 × 10⁶ has the right value, 45,000,000, but written properly it is 4.5 × 10⁷.
What grade is scientific notation?
Eighth grade. Students first write numbers in scientific notation and back, then multiply and divide with them, which our multiplying and dividing scientific notation worksheets practise.