- order in which bytes are stored in memory - 2 most common formats are big and little endian - most modern systems use little endian - also, little endian has the benefit that as the number increases, you don't have to shift all the existing digits to make space (unlike big endian) - you can just append the digits to the right - results in some computer operations being faster to perform - big endian: biggest part of number (aka most significant byte) stored at lowest memory address ![[big endian.png]] - little endian: smallest part of number stored 1st ![[little endian.png]]