PALAWAN STATE UNIVERSITY

Puerto Princesa City

Taytay Campus

Guidelines for Using Significant Figures (from Chang, R. & Goldsby, K. (2016). Chemistry.
(12thed.). New York: McGraw-Hill, Chapter 1, pp. 20-21)
In scientific work, significant figures are always to be observed.
Here are the rules on the use of significant figures:
1. Any digit that is not zero is significant.
(Eg. 483 g has three significant figures; 2,578 m has four significant figures)
2. Zeros between nonzero digits are significant.
(Eg. 6.06 kg has three significant figures; 60,804 cm has five significant figures)
3. Zeros to the left of the first nonzero digit are not significant.
(Eg. 0.078 L has two significant figures; 0.004 kg has one significant figure)
4. A. If a number is greater than 1, the zeros after the decimal point are significant.
(Eg. 4.0 mg has two significant figures; 20.04 g has four significant figures)
B. If a number is less than 1, only the zeros after the first nonzero digit are significant.
(Eg. 0.0750 m has three significant figures; 0.4006 g has four significant figures.
5. For numbers without decimal points, the zeroes at the end of nonzero digits may or may
not be significant (ambiguous). For example, 600 g may have one or three significant
figures. To avoid the ambiguity, we use scientific notation. We can say 6.00 g and this
will have three significant figures. Or we can say 6 x 102 and this will have only one
significant figure.

How do you handle significant figures in calculations?

1. In addition and subtraction, the answer cannot have more digits to the right of the decimal
point than either of the original numbers.
45.112 three digits after the decimal point
- 6.02 two digits after the decimal point
39.092 round-off to 30.09
So the answer will have two digits after the decimal point
2. For multiplication and division, the number of significant figures in the final product or
quotient is determined by the original number that has the smallest number of significant figures.
6.9 x 12.34 = 85.146 Round of the answer to 85, which has only two significant
figures.
26.98/3.05 = 23.93 Round of the answer to 23.9, which has three significant
figures because the smallest number of significant figures in the operation is 3.
3. Remember that exact numbers are considered to have infinite number of significant figures.
Rules for Rounding Off:
1. To round off a number at a certain point, drop the digits that follow if the first of them is less
than 5. 8.143 rounded off to only two significant figures becomes 8.1.
2. To round off a number at a certain point, add 1 to the preceding digit if the number that
follows is 5 or greater than 5. 7.378 rounded off to three significant digits becomes 7.38. 8.465
rounded off to three significant digits becomes 8.47. 0.575 rounded off to two significant digits
becomes 0.58.