What is 1/4 + 1/12?

Here's how we add

Step 1

Now we need to make our denominators match.

Since 4 is evenly divided by 12, we can multiply just one term to get a common denominator.

Multiply 1 by 3, and get 3, then we multiply 4 by 3 and get 12.

The problem now has new fractions to add:

Step 2

Since our denominators match, we can add the numerators.

3 + 1 = 4

This yields the answer

Step 3

The last step is to reduce the fraction if we can.

To find out, we try dividing it by 2...

Are both the numerator and the denominator evenly divisible by 2? Yes! So we reduce it:

Let's try dividing by that again...

Are both the numerator and the denominator evenly divisible by 2? Yes! So we reduce it:

Let's try dividing by that again...

No good. 2 is larger than 1. So we're done reducing.

There you have it! Here's the final answer to 1/4 + 1/12