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Digital information

ASCII character

An ASCII character is a letter, digit, punctuation mark or control code encoded using the American Standard Code for Information Interchange.

How big is it?

1 B · data

Data · example

Scale illustration of an ASCII character, showing the recorded data.
Recorded data: 1 B.

A little perspective

ASCII character vs Four-bit hexadecimal digit: data size comparison

The data size of an ASCII character is about 2 times the four-bit digit information content of a four-bit hexadecimal digit.

Scale

BYTES OF DATA

ASCII character

An ASCII character is a letter, digit, punctuation mark or control code encoded using the American Standard Code for Information Interchange.

1 BData
0
Four-bit hexadecimal digit

A four-bit hexadecimal digit is a data unit capable of representing any value from 0 to 15, commonly used in digital systems.

0.5 BFour-bit digit information content
0
Bar length represents bytes. The physical sizes of devices are schematic; encoding and compression affect file sizes.
Measurements, assumptions & sources +

ASCII character

Data: 1 B; example.

One ASCII character stored as one byte. UTF-8 characters can occupy more than one byte.

Defined examples — our methodology

The marked data is calibrated. Unmeasured illustration details are representative.

Four-bit hexadecimal digit

Four-bit digit information content: 0.5 B; exact conversion.

A hexadecimal digit represents one four-bit value; its 0.5-byte equivalent describes the bits represented, not text storage.

A hexadecimal digit represents four bits, exactly 0.5 byte; this does not count the bytes used to display the character as text.

NIST CSRC Glossary — 0xab

The marked four-bit digit information content is calibrated. Unmeasured illustration details are representative.

Use the visual comparison to explore its scale, then check the measurements and sources.

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Why this measurement?

Why we use 1 B

We compare the data size of an ASCII character. This is an illustrative comparison value, not a claim that every example is the same.

One ASCII character stored as one byte. UTF-8 characters can occupy more than one byte.

The picture identifies the subject; the diagram compares the recorded values. How calibrated comparisons work →

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Recorded properties

Dimensions and measurements

PropertySelected valueRecorded rangeBasis
1 BNot recordedexample

Around this scale

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Sources and method

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The source records and measurement method remain available for inspection.

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