Question

The sides of a rectangle are 12 cm and 16 cm. The length of its diagonal is ______.

Options

• 28 cm

• 4 cm

• `sqrt{12^2 + 16^2}" cm"`

• `sqrt{16^2 - 12^2}" cm"`

Answer 1

The sides of a rectangle are 12 cm and 16 cm. The length of its diagonal is `bbunderline(sqrt{12^2 + 16^2}" cm")`.

Explanation:

The diagonal of a rectangle forms the hypotenuse of a right-angled triangle with the two adjacent sides acting as its perpendicular legs. Applying Pythagoras’ theorem gives the length of the diagonal as the square root of the sum of the squares of these two side lengths, giving `sqrt{12^2 + 16^2}" cm"`.