Estimation · Flashcard

What is the quick rule for turning "per day" into "per second"?

easy

Answer

A day has 86,400 seconds; round it to 100,000. So 1 million a day is about 10 a second, and 1 billion a day about 10,000 a second.

Why

Rounding to 10⁵ keeps the arithmetic in powers of ten and errs on the low side by about 15%, which is well inside the accuracy an interview estimate needs.

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