1 square kilometer is equal to how many square meters?

• A. 1000 square m
• B. 1000000 square m
• C. 10000 square m
• D. 100 square m

Answer: (B)

Area conversions hinge on squaring the linear units. A kilometer is 1,000 meters, so for area you multiply by itself: (1,000 m) × (1,000 m) = 1,000,000 m^2. So 1 square kilometer equals 1,000,000 square meters. The other values are smaller areas and would correspond to much smaller square kilometers (for example, 1,000 m^2 is 0.001 km^2, 10,000 m^2 is 0.01 km^2, and 100 m^2 is 0.0001 km^2).