Java Why is converting a long (64) to float (32) considered widening?

Question

As it states from oracle

Reference from Oracle Docs

Widening Primitive Conversion 19 specific conversions on primitive types are called

Answer 1

If you look at the matter in simple terms, it is about how data has been represented by original designers.

ideally bit depth of long(64) is larger than float(32). But float data has represented using scientific notion which allows to represent considerably much larger range

Ex: 300[original number] : 3×102 [scientific representation]

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Long : -2^63 to 2^63-1

Float : (-3.4)*10^38 to (3.4)*10^38

Notice the Long(power of two) Vs Float(power of ten) representational difference here which allow float to have higher range

hope this is helpful