The first step a math tutor would suggest is to understand what it means when a number has an exponent. The “power” of a number indicates how many times the base would be multiplied by itself to reach the correct value.
The second step is to write the number in the base-exponent form, and lastly calculate what the final result would be. Consider the example of 2 to the power of 4: in exponent form that would be
So re-applying these steps to our particular problem, we first convert our word problem to a base-exponent form of:
To simplify this, all that is needed is to multiply it out:
81 x 81 x 81 x 81 x ... (for a total of 86 times) = 134806745333774999112544281108398762007604655842244477571882977030779380134578775342851931269350457135570573724739071148715794846730641753406450349374737686315878881
Therefore, 81 to the power of 86 is 134806745333774999112544281108398762007604655842244477571882977030779380134578775342851931269350457135570573724739071148715794846730641753406450349374737686315878881.