Page "Culture of France" Paragraph 141

* In mathematics, France uses the infix notation like most countries.

For large numbers the long scale is used.

Thus, the French use the word billion for the number 1, 000, 000, 000, 000, which in countries using short scale is called a trillion.

However, there exists a French word, milliard, for the number 1, 000, 000, 000, which in countries using the short scale is called a billion.

Thus, despite the use of the long scale, one billion is called un milliard (" one milliard ") in French, and not mille millions (" one thousand million ").

It should also be noted that names of numbers above the milliard are rarely used.

Thus, one trillion will most often be called mille milliards (“ one thousand milliard ”) in French, and rarely un billion.