nanosecond
noun
Did you know?
The nonserious use of nanosecond is probably much more common than the proper technical use. In measurement terms such as nanosecond, nanogram, and nanometer, nano- means "billionth;" in other kinds of words, its meaning isn't quite so precise. In computers, the speed of reading and writing to random access memory (RAM) is measured in nanoseconds. By comparison, the speed of reading or writing to a hard drive or a CD-ROM player, or for information to travel over the Internet, is measured in milliseconds (thousandths of a second), which are a million times longer than nanoseconds.
Examples of nanosecond in a Sentence
Aamir Khollam, Interesting Engineering, 4 Feb. 2026
These shifting patterns subtly alter when the pulses arrive, introducing timing delays on the order of tens of nanoseconds, the statement says.
—Sharmila Kuthunur, Space.com, 16 Jan. 2026
The kids got bored with it in nanoseconds, but word got out in the blue jay community that a peanut paradise had sprung up in our yard and to come on over!
—Inga, San Diego Union-Tribune, 5 Jan. 2026
After running for 8 hours, the clock deviated only by 102 nanoseconds, approaching the standard of atomic clocks while both requiring less physical space and less power to run.
—Perri Thaler, IEEE Spectrum, 17 Dec. 2025
See All Example Sentences for nanosecond
Cite this Entry
“Nanosecond.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nanosecond. Accessed 14 Feb. 2026.
Copy CitationKids Definition
nanosecond
noun
Medical Definition
nanosecond
noun
