Square Root Calculator

Find the square root of the number.

What is a square root?

A square root is a numerical figure that, when multiplied by itself, results in the original number. The way you can represent an operation is through the radical symbol (√)

To understand this concept a little bit more, it is necessary to know the origin of the words. The origin of the expression square root comes from the latin words "radix" and "quadrum", which means "of four". This way we can notice that the number has to be multiplied by itself.

Square root symbol/sign

The square root symbol looks like this:

How can you calculate a square root?

Calculating a square root is easy, you just have to find the number which multiplied by itself, this means, when squared, gives you the original number as a result.

If the number is a quadratic integer, the square root is exact and you can achieve this by working with natural numbers, this is, whole and positive numbers.

Let’s see this example

If we say that 6 × 6 = 36, then we will say that the square root of 36 is 6, or, in the case of 4 × 4 = 16, then the square root of 16 is 4.

There are numbers whose square root is exact, whether they are natural, whole, fractions or decimals. However, there are others that are not exact; hence, it is necessary to do a special procedure in order to find an exact square number or an average of some sort.

As you can see, calculating the square root of a number is easy, you just have to really understand the concept, which as we mentioned before, consists of finding that number that, when squared, equals the number you started with.

Square root history

A square root has different uses, which range from solving quadratic equations, to finding the side of a square, to finding and stating the values of the Pythagorean theorem. Likewise, knowing this operation is essential for different occupations and study levels; engineers, agronomists, and office workers need to have a good relationship with the famous square root.

Who introduced square root?

Square root studies go back to really ancient times, the first Egyptians used this operation to solve some geometric problems. Currently, we can see how the square root is represented by a sort of V with a horizontal bar to the right over the numbers inside the radical symbol.

What is the origin of this symbol?

The german mathematician Chistoph Rudolff first proposed using this symbol specifically in 1525, in his book Die Coss.

This symbol is a stylized and elegant lowercase r, which was elongated with a horizontal bar until it adopted the form we see today. This "r" represents the latin word "radix", which means "root".