How Many Zeros in a Padma?
A padma has 15 zeros in the Indian numbering system: 1,00,00,00,00,00,00,000 — equal to one quadrillion (1,000,000,000,000,000) in the international system, or 1015. One padma equals 100 neel, 10,000 kharab, or one million crore. The name "padma" comes from Sanskrit, where it referred to the lotus flower and was used symbolically for vast astronomical quantities. It is part of the classical extended Indian numbering scale that appears in ancient mathematical and religious texts across the Indian subcontinent. Learn more about how many zeros in a crore.
A padma has
15
zeros
- Written Form
- 1 followed by 15 zeros
- Scientific
- 10¹⁵
- Western
- 1,000,000,000,000,000
How Many Zeros Are in a Padma?
A padma has exactly 15 zeros: 1015, with 15 zeros following the leading 1. Each step up the traditional Indian scale adds two zeros, so padma has two more zeros than neel (13 zeros) and two fewer than shankh (17 zeros). Learn more about zeros in an ank.
| Unit | Zeros | International equivalent |
|---|---|---|
| Neel | 13 | 10 trillion |
| Padma | 15 | 1 quadrillion |
| Shankh | 17 | 100 quadrillion |
Coincidentally, a padma has the same number of zeros as a petabyte (1015 bytes) — though the two are unrelated; one is a counting unit, the other a digital storage unit.
What Does Padma Equal in the International System?
One padma equals one quadrillion in the international short-scale system. This makes padma a numerically exact match for the SI prefix "peta-" (1015), used in petabyte storage. In terms of more common international units: 1 padma = 1,000 trillion = 1,000,000 billion. To convert padma to trillions, multiply by 1,000.
Despite the large value, padma is not used in modern South Asian finance or economics. National budgets, GDP figures, and corporate revenues in India are typically expressed in crore or lakh crore, making padma — at one million crore — too large for everyday reporting. The term survives primarily in academic discussions of ancient Indian mathematics and in comparative explanations of how different cultures named large numbers. Learn more about kharab zeros.
What Is 100 Padma Called?
One hundred padma equals one shankh (1017). Each unit in the extended Indian scale is exactly 100 times the one below it, so 100 padma = 1 shankh = 100 quadrillion. The full progression from padma upward runs: padma → shankh → mahashankh → ank, with each step adding two zeros.