Millisecond facts for kids

A millisecond (often shortened to 'ms') is a super tiny unit of time. It's exactly one thousandth of a second! To give you an idea of how incredibly fast a millisecond is, you can check out this video.

One millisecond is made up of 1000 microseconds. And, as you might guess, there are 1000 milliseconds in just one second.

Milliseconds in Action

Here are some cool examples of how short a millisecond really is:

• 1 millisecond: This is how long a normal camera flash lasts. Blink and you'll miss it!
• 1 millisecond: Sound can travel about 34 centimeters in this amount of time. That's about the length of a ruler.
• 1.000692286 milliseconds: Light, which is super fast, travels 300 kilometers in a vacuum during this time. That's like going from London to Paris almost instantly!
• 2 milliseconds: This is the half-life of a special element called hassium-265. (Half-life means the time it takes for half of something to change or disappear.)
• 3 milliseconds: A housefly can flap its wings in just 3 milliseconds. That's why they're so hard to catch!
• 3.4 milliseconds: The half-life of another element, meitnerium-266.
• 5 milliseconds: A honeybee flaps its wings in about 5 milliseconds.
• 8 milliseconds: This is a common shutter speed on a camera, often written as 1/125 of a second. It helps capture fast-moving things without blur.
• 9 milliseconds: When your computer's hard disk is looking for information, it takes about 9 milliseconds to find it. This is called "seek time."
• 33.3 milliseconds: If you're watching a video that plays at 30 frames per second (fps), each single picture (frame) lasts for this amount of time.
• 30 to 100 milliseconds: This is the normal delay you might experience when using a broadband internet connection. It's called "latency."
• 100 milliseconds: This is roughly how fast a human can react to something. For example, if you see a ball coming towards you, it takes about 100 milliseconds for your brain to tell your body to move.
• 102 milliseconds: The half-life of bohrium-262, another element.
• 134 milliseconds: It takes light about 134 milliseconds to travel all the way around the earth's equator.
• 200 to 670 milliseconds: This is the time between beats in modern dance music, which usually has a BPM (beats per minute) of 128 to 150.
• 300 to 400 milliseconds: This is how long it takes for a human eye to blink.
• 838 milliseconds: The half-life of lithium-8.

See also

In Spanish: Milisegundo para niños