Question

Sodium bicarbonate is the chemical name for baking powder. It’s chemical formula is NaHCO3. What does the subscript 3 means?

Answer 1

The subscript 3 means that there is 3 oxygen.

Answer 2

Explanation:

The number present as a subscript in a chemical formula depicts the number of atoms of each element present in the compound.

For example, in $NaHCO_{3}$ here no subscript is present below Na, H and C atoms.

This means that only one atom of Na, one atom of C and one atom of H are present in a molecule of $NaHCO_{3}$.

Since, subscript 3 is present below O atom. This means that 3 atoms of oxygen are present in a molecule of $NaHCO_{3}$.