Question

The length of a rectangle is 1 units more than the width. The area of the rectangle is 20 square units. What is the length, in units, of the rectangle?

Answer 1

5 units

Explanation:

You want the length of a rectangle with an area of 20 square units if the length is 1 more than the width.

Factors

The area of the rectangle is the product of its length and width. For an area of 20, we're interested in two factors of 20 that differ by 1.

Factors of 20 are ...

20 = 1·20 = 2·10 = 4·5

The factor pair 4·5 has one factor that is 1 unit more than the other. The larger one is 5.

The length of the rectangle if 5 units.