ISEE Upper Level Quantitative Reasoning › How to find the greatest common factor
What is the greatest common factor of and
?
To solve for the greatest common factor, it is necessary to get your numbers into prime factor form. For each of your numbers, this is:
Next, for each of your sets of prime factors, you need to choose the exponent for which you have the smallest value; therefore, for your values, you choose:
:
:
:
: None
: None
Taking these together, you get:
What is the greatest common factor of and
?
To solve for the greatest common factor, it is necessary to get your numbers into prime factor form. For each of your numbers, this is:
Next, for each of your sets of prime factors, you need to choose the exponent for which you have the smallest value; therefore, for your values, you choose:
:
: None
: None
: None
Taking these together, you get:
Find the greatest common factor of 20 and 36.
To find the greatest common factor (GCF), you need to determine the factor that both numbers share that is of the greatest value. List the factors of each number and identify the largest number in value that is in both lists:
The GCF of 20 and 36 is 4 since it is the largest number in value that shows up in both lists.
3/5 + 4/7 – 1/3 =
88/105
3/37
7/9
72/89
We need to find a common denominator to add and subtract these fractions. Let's do the addition first. The lowest common denominator of 5 and 7 is 5 * 7 = 35, so 3/5 + 4/7 = 21/35 + 20/35 = 41/35.
Now to the subtraction. The lowest common denominator of 35 and 3 is 35 * 3 = 105, so altogether, 3/5 + 4/7 – 1/3 = 41/35 – 1/3 = 123/105 – 35/105 = 88/105. This does not simplify and is therefore the correct answer.
What is the greatest common factor of and
?
To solve for the greatest common factor, it is necessary to get your numbers into prime factor form. For each of your numbers, this is:
Next, for each of your sets of prime factors, you need to choose the exponent for which you have the smallest value; therefore, for your values, you choose:
: None
:
: None
: None
Taking these together, you get:
What is the greatest common factor of and
?
Factor each number:
Identify the common factors (). The greatest common factor is the product of all of the common factors.
Find the greatest common factor (GCF) of 56 and 64.
Find the greatest common factor (GCF) of 56 and 64.
To find the GCF, first find the prime factors of our two numbers:
Now, to find our GCF, we need to find the prime factors our two numbers have in common.
In this case, we have three 2's in common. In other words, we have an 8 in common. So, our GCF is 8.
Column A Column B
The GCF of The GCF of
45 and 120 38 and 114
The quantity in Column B is greater.
The quantity in Column A is greater.
The quantities are equal.
There is not enough info to determine the relationship.
There are a couple different ways to find the GCF of a set of numbers. Sometimes it's easiest to make a factor tree for each number. The factors that the pair of numbers have in common are then multiplied to get the GCF. So for 45, the prime factorization ends up being: . The prime factorization of 120 is:
. Since they have a 5 and 3 in common, those are multiplied together to get 15 for the GCF. Repeat the same process for 38 and 114. The prime factorization of 38 is
. The prime factorization of 114 is
. Therefore, multiply 19 and 2 to get 38 for their GCF. Column B is greater.
What is the greatest common factor of and
Fully factor and
. Circle the factors in common:
Multiple the common factors to find the greatest common factor:
Find the greatest common factor (GCF) of 324 and 56.
Find the greatest common factor (GCF) of 324 and 56.
The GCF is the largest number which will can be evenly divided from either number.
To find the GCF, first find the prime factors of both numbers. A good trick here is to start by pulling a two out of each number until you cannot pull out a two anymore.
Beginning with 56
So the prime factorization of 56 looks like:
Next, let's do 324.
So for 324 we get:
Now, the GCF can be found by taking the prime factors which are common to both numbers. Now, in this case, we have two 2's in each number, and nothing else. This means that the GCF of 56 and 324 is
So our answer is 4