Science Common Sense

62 - How do earthquakes measure their strength?

Earthquakes measure their strength using something called the 'Richter scale.' It's like a report card for earthquakes.

Imagine a big zero, and the more the Earth shakes, the higher the number goes. The Richter scale goes from 0 to 10. Zero is very small and you probably won't feel it. Ten is super strong – it's like the whole world is shaking.

But here's the cool part: each step on the Richter scale is 10 times stronger than the one before it. So if it's a 3, it's 10 times stronger than a 2, and 100 times stronger than a 1.

Nowadays, scientists use something called the 'moment magnitude scale' which is more accurate than the Richter scale, but both measure how much the Earth is shaking during an earthquake.