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:
99 x 99 x 99 x 99 x ... (for a total of 87 times) = 417120879933220675381816712512036545138912699084280583663207213807936364408333206792708310813441891301021083287536733543359096141318739253639335503708346305283597086457598699
Therefore, 99 to the power of 87 is 417120879933220675381816712512036545138912699084280583663207213807936364408333206792708310813441891301021083287536733543359096141318739253639335503708346305283597086457598699.

