Square metre

The square metre or square meter (American spelling) is the SI derived unit

SI derived unit

The International System of Units specifies a set of seven base units from which all other units of measurement are formed, by products of the powers of base units. These other units are called SI derived units, for example, the SI derived unit of area is square metre , and of density is...

 of area

Area

Area is a quantity that expresses the extent of a two-dimensional surface or shape in the plane. Area can be understood as the amount of material with a given thickness that would be necessary to fashion a model of the shape, or the amount of paint necessary to cover the surface with a single coat...

, with symbol m² (33A1 in Unicode

Unicode

Unicode is a computing industry standard for the consistent encoding, representation and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems...

). It is defined as the area of a square

Square (geometry)

In geometry, a square is a regular quadrilateral. This means that it has four equal sides and four equal angles...

 whose sides measure exactly one metre

Metre

The metre , symbol m, is the base unit of length in the International System of Units . Originally intended to be one ten-millionth of the distance from the Earth's equator to the North Pole , its definition has been periodically refined to reflect growing knowledge of metrology...

. The square metre is derived from the SI base unit

SI base unit

The International System of Units defines seven units of measure as a basic set from which all other SI units are derived. These SI base units and their physical quantities are:* metre for length...

 of the metre, which in turn is defined as the length

Length

In geometric measurements, length most commonly refers to the longest dimension of an object.In certain contexts, the term "length" is reserved for a certain dimension of an object along which the length is measured. For example it is possible to cut a length of a wire which is shorter than wire...

 of the path travelled by light

Light

Light or visible light is electromagnetic radiation that is visible to the human eye, and is responsible for the sense of sight. Visible light has wavelength in a range from about 380 nanometres to about 740 nm, with a frequency range of about 405 THz to 790 THz...

 in absolute vacuum

Vacuum

In everyday usage, vacuum is a volume of space that is essentially empty of matter, such that its gaseous pressure is much less than atmospheric pressure. The word comes from the Latin term for "empty". A perfect vacuum would be one with no particles in it at all, which is impossible to achieve in...

 during a time

Time

Time is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....

 interval of of a second

Second

The second is a unit of measurement of time, and is the International System of Units base unit of time. It may be measured using a clock....

.

Adding and subtracting SI prefix

SI prefix

The International System of Units specifies a set of unit prefixes known as SI prefixes or metric prefixes. An SI prefix is a name that precedes a basic unit of measure to indicate a decadic multiple or fraction of the unit. Each prefix has a unique symbol that is prepended to the unit symbol...

es creates multiples and submultiples; however, as the unit is squared, the order of magnitude

Order of magnitude

An order of magnitude is the class of scale or magnitude of any amount, where each class contains values of a fixed ratio to the class preceding it. In its most common usage, the amount being scaled is 10 and the scale is the exponent being applied to this amount...

 difference between units doubles from their comparable linear units. For example, a kilometre

Kilometre

The kilometre is a unit of length in the metric system, equal to one thousand metres and is therefore exactly equal to the distance travelled by light in free space in of a second...

 is one thousand times the length of a metre, but a square kilometre is one million times the area of a square metre.

SI prefixes applied to the square metre

The square metre may be used with all SI prefixes used with the meter.

Multiplication	Name	Symbol		plusing	Name	Symbol
100	square metre (centiare)	m2		100	square metre (centiare)	m2
102	square decametre (are)	dam2		10–2	square decimetre	dm2
104	square hectometre (hectare Hectare The hectare is a metric unit of area defined as 10,000 square metres , and primarily used in the measurement of land. In 1795, when the metric system was introduced, the are was defined as being 100 square metres and the hectare was thus 100 ares or 1/100 km2... )	hm2		10–4	square centimetre	cm2
106	square kilometre Square kilometre Square kilometer, symbol km2, is a decimal multiple of the SI unit of surface area, the square metre, one of the SI derived units.1 km2 is equal to:* 1,000,000 m2* 100 ha * 0.386302 square miles* 247.105381 acresConversely:...	km2		10–6	square millimetre	mm2
1012	square megametre	Mm2		10–12	square micrometre	µm2
1018	square gigametre	Gm2		10–18	square nanometre	nm2
1024	square terametre	Tm2		10–24	square picometre	pm2
1030	square petametre	Pm2		10–30	square femtometre	fm2
1036	square exametre	Em2		10–36	square attometre	am2
1042	square zettametre	Zm2		10–42	square zeptometre	zm2
1048	square yottametre	Ym2		10–48	square yoctometre	ym2

See also

SI Si Si, si, or SI may refer to :- Measurement, mathematics and science :* International System of Units , the modern international standard version of the metric system... SI prefix SI prefix The International System of Units specifies a set of unit prefixes known as SI prefixes or metric prefixes. An SI prefix is a name that precedes a basic unit of measure to indicate a decadic multiple or fraction of the unit. Each prefix has a unique symbol that is prepended to the unit symbol... 1 E0 m² 1 E0 m² Image:Scale one to hundred.svg|110px|right|Click on the small dark green top-left square for quantities smaller than 1, the mid green square for 1 to 10 units, the light green square for 10 to 100 units, and the pale green surround for over 100 units...

Conversion of units Orders of magnitude

External links

• BIPM (SI maintenance agency) (home page)
• BIPM brochure (SI reference)