Etymology

megabyte

M3E1G2A1B3Y4T1E1

Today it means: One million (10⁶, or 1,000,000) bytes or 1,000 kilobytes. Full definition →

English byte ← Middle English biten ← Old English bītan
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The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European*méǵh₂s
  2. Proto-Hellenic*mégas
  3. Ancient Greekμέγᾰς (mégăs)
  4. Englishmega-
  5. Proto-Indo-European*bʰeyd-
  6. Proto-Indo-European*bʰéydt
  7. Proto-Germanic*bītaną
  8. Proto-West Germanic*bītan
  9. Old Englishbītan
  10. Middle Englishbiten
  11. Englishbite
  12. Englishbyte
  13. English todaymegabyte

From mega- + byte.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.