Standard Lemma guide

byte

noun · 3 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot

Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.

Sound

Pronunciation

Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.

  • /baɪt/
  • US: Recorded audio is listed in the source snapshot.
  • rhymes with -aɪt
  • homophone: bight
  • homophone: bite
  • homophone: by't
  • CMU ARPABET: B AY1 T Digits mark lexical stress: 1 primary, 2 secondary, 0 unstressed.

1

noun

Meaning 1

A short sequence of bits (binary digits) that can be operated on as a unit by a computer; the smallest usable machine word.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Topics: computing, engineering, mathematics, natural-sciences, physical-sciences, sciences

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

2

noun

Meaning 2

A unit of computing storage equal to eight bits, which can represent any of 256 distinct values.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Qualifier: most commonly

Topics: computing, engineering, mathematics, natural-sciences, physical-sciences, sciences

Examples

  • The word “hello” fits into five bytes of ASCII code.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: B, octet

Antonyms: none provided

3

noun

Meaning 3

a sequence of 8 bits (enough to represent one character of alphanumeric data) processed as a single unit of information

Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

Broader terms: computer memory unit

History

Etymology

An alteration of the word bite so it would not be accidentally misspelled as bit. Coined by Werner Buchholz in 1956, during the early design phase for the IBM 7030 Stretch computer.

Across languages

Translations

88 source translations are retained for this English entry.

  • Afrikaans: greep — 8-bit unit
  • Arabic: بَايْت (bāyt) — 8-bit unit
  • Armenian: բայտ (bayt) — 8-bit unit
  • Azerbaijani: bayt — 8-bit unit
  • Belarusian: байт (bajt) — 8-bit unit
  • Bengali: বাইট (baiṭ) — 8-bit unit
  • Breton: eizhbit — 8-bit unit
  • Bulgarian: байт (bajt) — 8-bit unit
  • Burmese: ဘိုက် (bhuik) — 8-bit unit
  • Catalan: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Catalan: octet — 8-bit unit
  • Chinese Cantonese: 字節 /字节 (zi6 zit3) — 8-bit unit
  • Chinese Cantonese: 位元組 /位元组 (wai6 jyun4 zou2) — 8-bit unit
  • Chinese Mandarin: 字節 /字节 (zìjié) — 8-bit unit
  • Chinese Mandarin: 位元組 /位元组 (wèiyuánzǔ) — 8-bit unit
  • Czech: bajt — 8-bit unit
  • Czech: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Esperanto: bajto — 8-bit unit
  • Esperanto: bitoko — 8-bit unit
  • Esperanto: okopo — 8-bit unit
  • Estonian: bait — 8-bit unit
  • Finnish: tavu — 8-bit unit
  • French: octet — 8-bit unit
  • Galician: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Georgian: ბაიტი (baiṭi) — 8-bit unit
  • German: Byte — 8-bit unit
  • Greek: μπάιτ (báit) — 8-bit unit
  • Greek: δυφιοσυλλαβή (dyfiosyllaví) — 8-bit unit
  • Greek: δυφιοοκτάδα (dyfiooktáda) — 8-bit unit
  • Hebrew: בַּיִת (báyit) — 8-bit unit
  • Hindi: बाइट (bāiṭ) — 8-bit unit
  • Hungarian: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Icelandic: bæti — 8-bit unit
  • Icelandic: tölvustafur — 8-bit unit
  • Ido: bicoko — 8-bit unit
  • Indonesian: bita — 8-bit unit
  • Interlingua: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Italian: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Italian: bicarattere — 8-bit unit
  • Italian: ottetto — 8-bit unit
  • Italian: multipletto — 8-bit unit
  • Japanese: バイト (baito) — 8-bit unit
  • Kazakh: байт (bait) — 8-bit unit
  • Khmer: បៃ (bai) — 8-bit unit
  • Korean: 바이트 (baiteu) — 8-bit unit
  • Kyrgyz: байт (bayt) — 8-bit unit
  • Lao: ໄບຕ໌ (bait) — 8-bit unit
  • Lao: ໄບ (bai) — 8-bit unit
  • Latin: octetus — 8-bit unit
  • Latvian: baits — 8-bit unit
  • Lithuanian: baitas — 8-bit unit
  • Lü: ᦢᦺ (ḃay) — 8-bit unit
  • Macedonian: бајт (bajt) — 8-bit unit
  • Malay: bait — 8-bit unit
  • Māori: paita — 8-bit unit
  • Navajo: łaʼííłké — 8-bit unit
  • Persian: بایت (bâyt) — 8-bit unit
  • Polish: bajt — 8-bit unit
  • Portuguese: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Portuguese: baite — 8-bit unit
  • Romanian: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Romanian: octet — 8-bit unit
  • Russian: байт (bajt) — 8-bit unit
  • Russian: окте́т (oktét) — 8-bit unit
  • Serbo-Croatian: бајт — 8-bit unit
  • Serbo-Croatian: bajt — 8-bit unit
  • Sinhalese: බයිට (bayiṭa) — 8-bit unit
  • Slovak: bajt — 8-bit unit
  • Slovak: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Spanish: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Spanish: octeto — 8-bit unit
  • Swahili: baiti — 8-bit unit
  • Swedish: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Tajik: байт (bayt) — 8-bit unit
  • Thai: ไบต์ (bái) — 8-bit unit
  • Northern Thai: ᨷᩱ — 8-bit unit
  • Tibetan: ཡིག་ཚིགས (yig tshigs) — 8-bit unit
  • Turkish: bayt — 8-bit unit
  • Ukrainian: байт (bajt) — 8-bit unit
  • Urdu: لکمہ — 8-bit unit
  • Uyghur: بايت (bayt) — 8-bit unit
  • Uzbek: bayt — 8-bit unit
  • Vietnamese: byte — 8-bit unit
  • Vietnamese: bai — 8-bit unit
  • Vietnamese: bai-tơ — 8-bit unit
  • Welsh: beit — 8-bit unit
  • Yiddish: בײַט (bayt) — 8-bit unit
  • Zulu: isimumathalwazi — 8-bit unit