How many megabytes are in a gigabyte?

In digital storage, the relationship between megabytes and gigabytes is based on the binary system commonly used in computing. One gigabyte is defined as 1024 megabytes. This is because the binary system uses powers of 2; thus, 1 gigabyte equals 2^10 megabytes, which calculates to 1024. This is a crucial understanding when dealing with file sizes, memory capacities, and data storage, as it demonstrates the way computer systems interpret and manage memory and storage capacities.

The other options do not accurately represent the conversion between gigabytes and megabytes. The numbers 512, 256, and 128 do not align with the standard definition of these units, which is why they do not contribute to an understanding of the conversion process in data measurement.