Percentages of …

To find a percentage of any amount, start by finding 10%

Finding 10% is easy – just divide the amount by 10

So, to find 10% of 120, all you do is 120 ÷ 10 = 12

So,

10% of 120 = 12

If we need to find 30% of an amount, we still start by finding 10% (remember: to find 10%, just divide the amount by 10).

To go from 10% to 30% we just multiply by 3.

Example:

Find 30% of 80

Answer:

First, find 10% of 80:

10% of 80 = 80 ÷ 10 = 8

30% = 10% x 3, so

30% 0f 80 = 8 x 3 = 24.

Finding 5% of an amount is not much harder.

Again start by finding 10%.

5% is just half of 10%, so when you’ve found 10%, just halve it (divide by 2) to get 5%.

Example

Find 5% of 260

Answer

10% of 260 = 260 ÷ 10 = 26

5% = 10% ÷ 2

so 5% = 26 ÷ 2 = 13

And now we can put that all together in a “tough” (only joking!) example!

Example

Find 65% of 180

Answer

First (as ever!) find 10%:

10% of 180 = 180 ÷ 10 = 18

so

60% of 180 = 10% x 6 = 18 x 6 = 108

Now find 5%

5% of 180 = 10% ÷ 2 = 18 ÷ 2 = 9

… and …

65% = 60% + 5%

=  108 + 9 = 117

So,

65% 0f 180 = 117

Easy!

Remember:

To find a percentage of any amount start by finding 10%

To find 10% of an amount, simply divide by 10

If you want to find out more about percentages, and how to swap between fractions, decimals and percentages, then you may want to read this.