kilobits

Kilobit is a unit of information equal to 1000 bits, following the SI prefix kilo- (10^3). The term is most commonly encountered in data rate measurements, where speeds are expressed as kilobits per second (kbps) to describe network capacity or channel throughput.

In practice, kilobits are rarely used to quantify stored data. Data quantities are usually described in bytes, with bits converted to bytes by dividing by eight. Consequently, 1 kilobit equals 0.125 kilobyte in decimal terms. In binary-oriented contexts, the analogous unit is the kibibit (1 kibibit = 1024 bits), though the latter is less frequently used in everyday language.

Kilobits per second (kbps) are widely used to report connection speeds for telecommunications and networks. For example, dial-up modems historically achieved around 56 kbps, while modern broadband is measured in megabits per second. As data rates scale upward, the use of kilobits becomes less common for very high speeds, with megabits per second (Mbps) and gigabits per second (Gbps) becoming standard.

Ambiguity can arise because “kb” is sometimes used informally to denote either kilobits or kilobytes. To avoid confusion, the expressions kilobit (kbit), kilobits per second (kbit/s or kbps), or clearly stated units are preferred. Kilobits remain a fundamental concept in information theory and telecommunications, particularly when describing transmission speeds at the bit level. See also kilobyte, kibibit, data rate, and bits per second.