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The kilometre (SI symbol: km; / ˈ k ɪ l ə m iː t ər / or / k ɪ ˈ l ɒ m ə t ər /), spelt kilometer in American and Philippine English, is a unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), equal to one thousand metres (kilo-being the SI prefix for 1000).
kilometre (km) or kilometer is a metric unit used, outside the US, to measure the length of a journey; the international statute mile (mi) is used in the US; 1 mi = 1.609344 km; nautical mile is rarely used to derive units of transportation quantity.
Length; system unit code (other) symbol or abbrev. notes conversion factor/m combinations SI: gigametre: Gm Gm US spelling: gigameter 1.0 Gm (620,000 mi) megametre: Mm Mm US spelling: megameter
Metric prefixes; Text Symbol Factor or; yotta Y 10 24: 1 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000: zetta Z 10 21: 1 000 000 000 000 000 000 000: exa E 10 18: 1 000 000 000 000 000 000: peta P 10 15: 1 000 000 000 000 000: tera T
Earth radius R 🜨 ≈ 6,371 km [9] Lunar distance LD ≈ 384 402 km. [10] Average distance between the center of Earth and the center of the Moon. astronomical unit au. Defined as 149 597 870 700 m. [11] Approximately the distance between the Earth and Sun. light-year ly ≈ 9 460 730 472 580.8 km.
Conversions between units in the metric system are defined by their prefixes (for example, 1 kilogram = 1000 grams, 1 milligram = 0.001 grams) and are thus not listed in this article. Exceptions are made if the unit is commonly known by another name (for example, 1 micron = 10 −6 metre).
There are issues about using kilometres (or "kilometers") in pages. The Manual of Style has advised to show the first amount mentioned in kilometers with the word spelled-out for the language dialect of the article ("kilometers" for U.S. English).
For example, 5 km is treated as 5000 m, which allows all quantities based on the same unit to be factored together even if they have different prefixes. A prefix symbol attached to a unit symbol is included when the unit is raised to a power. For example, 1 km 2 denotes 1 km × 1 km = 10 6 m 2, not 10 3 m 2.