noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   A measure of the strength of an explosion or a bomb based on how many billion tons of TNT would be needed to produce the same energy. (A derived unit for TNT equivalent.)

   "Holonyms: teraton < petaton < exaton (rare) < zettaton (rare) < yottaton (rare)"

2. 2
   One billion tons.; One billion short tons (10⁹ × 2000 lb).
3. 3
   One billion tons.; One billion long tons (10⁹ × 2240 lb).
4. 4
   One billion tons.; One billion metric tons (10⁹ × 2204.6 lb).

   "Meronyms: kiloton < megaton"

Example

More examples

"Holonyms: teraton < petaton < exaton (rare) < zettaton (rare) < yottaton (rare)"

Etymology

From giga- + ton.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.