What do the French consider to be a billion? 100,000,000 or 1,000,000,000?
A French billion
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Jackie E.Kwiziq community member
A French billion
This question relates to:French lesson "Expressing large numbers -thousands/millions/billions - in French"
Asked 3 weeks ago
Bonjour Jackie,
If you mean what's the equivalent of an English billion in French, it is a milliard, and it has nine zeros.
1,000,000,000
If you mean what's a French billion, it is the equivalent of 1,000 milliards with twelve zeros. It is the equivalent of an American trillion, I believe.
1,000,000,000,000
Very confusing!
Anne D.Kwiziq Q&A super contributor
To make matters worse, an English billion used to be a million million as well. It’s now generally harmonised with American usage, ie a thousand million.
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