Round to 2 Significant Figures
Rounding to 2 significant figures keeps the two leading meaningful digits: 47,386 becomes 47,000, and 0.0047386 becomes 0.0047. Two figures is the standard reporting precision for most school science and quick journalism statistics — enough to show a difference between 4,700 and 4,800 without inventing accuracy the measurement never had. All values on this page use standard half-up rounding.
Round to 2 Significant Figures reference last updated · reference source
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Dated static reference; no live data is fetched. Verify current source values and assumptions before relying on results.
What this tool does
Rounding to 2 significant figures keeps the two leading meaningful digits: 47,386 becomes 47,000, and 0.0047386 becomes 0.0047. Two figures is the standard reporting precision for most school science and quick journalism statistics — enough to show a difference between 4,700 and 4,800 without inventing accuracy the measurement never had. All values on this page use standard half-up rounding.
How to use the Round to 2 Significant Figures
- Check Number to round: 47386.
- Check Round to: sigfig.
- Check Significant figures: 2.
- Review the Round to 2 Significant Figures result and its exact-value comparison table.
- Verify assumptions before applying the result.
Formula
Round half up at the chosen precision: decimal places count digits after the point, significant figures count digits that carry meaning from the first nonzero digit, and nearest-multiple rounding snaps to a grid such as the nearest 100.
- x
- Number to round
- mode
- Round to
- places
- Decimal places
- figs
- Significant figures
- multiple
- Nearest multiple of
Ties round half up (away from zero for the magnitude shown in most school contexts); financial rounding rules such as banker's rounding are not applied.
Worked example
Round to 2 Significant Figures: Number to round = 47386; Round to = sigfig; Significant figures = 2. Rounding to 2 significant figures keeps the two leading meaningful digits: 47,386 becomes 47,000, and 0.0047386 becomes 0.0047. Two figures is the standard reporting precision for most school science and quick journalism statistics — enough to show a difference between 4,700 and 4,800 without inventing accuracy the measurement never had. All values on this page use standard half-up rounding.
Inputs
- Number to round47386
- Round toSignificant figures
- Decimal places2
- Significant figures2
- Nearest multiple of100
Result
- Rounded value4.7e+4
- As a number47,000
Round to 2 Significant Figures — worked examples
| Number | Rounded |
|---|---|
| 47386 | 4.7e+4 |
| 47499 | 4.7e+4 |
| 47500 | 4.8e+4 |
| 0.0047386 | 0.0047 |
| 0.00475 | 0.0047 |
| 987 | 9.9e+2 |
| 995 | 1.0e+3 |
| 10499 | 1.0e+4 |
Results explained
- Rounded value
- Rounded value from the formula above. Ties round half up (away from zero for the magnitude shown in most school contexts); financial rounding rules such as banker's rounding are not applied.
- Decimal places
- Decimal places from the formula above. Ties round half up (away from zero for the magnitude shown in most school contexts); financial rounding rules such as banker's rounding are not applied.
Frequently asked questions
Rounding to 2 significant figures keeps the two leading meaningful digits: 47,386 becomes 47,000, and 0.0047386 becomes 0.0047. The reference table on this page shows 8 worked examples computed with exactly that rule.
The tie appears when the third significant digit is exactly 5 with nothing after it: 4,750 rounds up to 4,800 at two significant figures under half-up.
Use it for lab results from two-digit instruments, percentages in reports (47%), and converting calculator vomit into a defensible reported value.
0.0047386 rounds to 0.0047. You can verify it in the table on this page, or type any other value into the calculator above.
Display precision is not measurement accuracy. The extra digits are guard digits: they stop rounding errors compounding through a chain of calculations. The discipline is to carry full precision internally and round once, at the very end, to the figures your instruments justify — rounding at every step ('rounding creep') can drift a final answer by several percent.
No. Banker's rounding (round-half-to-even) is used in some scientific and financial standards to reduce bias over huge datasets, but this page — and the parent rounding calculator — always rounds a halfway value up, which is the convention taught in schools and used for tax forms.
Yes, with one nuance: the engine rounds halves toward positive infinity, so 47.5 rounds up to 48 at the nearest dollar while -47.5 becomes -47. Away from exact halves, negative values round to the nearest candidate just like positive ones.