Unlike our everyday counting system that uses tens, binary uses just two numbers, 0 and 1. Learn more with BBC Bitesize. Suitable for KS3 students.

The binary number will appear. With this example, Excel will display "01100100." The initial zero does not affect the number's magnitude, but it completes the byte.

Here’s the command to display decimal 16 as a binary number: $ echo “obase=2; 16” | bc 10000 Described in base 10, that’s one 16, no 8s, no 4s, no 2s, and no 1s.