Number Bases & Scientific Notation

Notes Calculator accepts numbers written in scientific notation or in hexadecimal, binary, and octal — and you can ask any result to render in those formats with an in / as postfix.

Scientific notation literals

Use e (or E) to write a number in scientific notation. The exponent sign is optional.

1.5e6                                  | 1,500,000
2.5E-3                                 | 0.0025
5e+3                                   | 5,000
1e10                                   | 10,000,000,000

Scientific literals participate in arithmetic exactly like any other number:

1.5e6 + 1                              | 1,500,001
1.5e6 * 2                              | 3,000,000

Hex, binary, and octal literals

Prefix integer literals with 0x (hex), 0b (binary), or 0o (octal). The prefix and digits are case-insensitive.

0xFF                                   | 255
0xDEADBEEF                             | 3,735,928,559
0b1010                                 | 10
0b11111111                             | 255
0o17                                   | 15
0O377                                  | 255

Mix bases freely in expressions:

0xFF + 1                               | 256
0b1010 + 5                             | 15

Display postfix: in / as

Append in <format> or as <format> to a number or expression to choose how the result is displayed. The underlying value is unchanged — only the rendering is affected.

255 in hex                             | FF
255 in binary                          | 11111111
255 in octal                           | 377
1234567 as scientific                  | 1.234567e6
1234567 as fixed                       | 1,234,567

Both in and as are accepted, and as decimal is an alias for as fixed.

The postfix attaches to the whole expression on its left, so parentheses can be used to format an arithmetic result:

(0xFF + 1) in hex                      | 100
(0b1010 + 5) in binary                 | 1111

in hex, in binary, and in octal require an integer value — non-integers produce an error.

Global default format

The default format for numeric results is set in Settings → Number format:

• Auto — plain decimal for everyday values; switches to scientific for very large or very small numbers. (Default.)
• Scientific — every number renders in scientific notation.
• Fixed — every number renders as a plain decimal, never in scientific notation.

A per-line as scientific / as fixed postfix always overrides the global setting.