How does one find the common denominator in a fraction?

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Answer 1 · 2016-04-16T09:23:23

See explanation.

The simpliest way to find the common denominator of set of fractions is to multiply all denominators.

Example:

The common denominator of $1/2,1/3,1/4$ can be $2*3*4=24$

As you see the common denominator found this way is not always the lowest one. The lowest common denominator of these values is $12$

For any 2 fractions the lowest common denominator can be calculated as:

$lcd(a.b)=(a*b)/gcd(a,b)$

where $gcd$ is the greatest commoin divisor of numbers $a$ and $b$ .