Converting between binary and hex is super easy and can be done by just processing 4 bits at a time (4 binary digits = 1 hexadecimal digit). Converting to/from base 10 is a bunch of annoying math. No easy way around it. It'll be useful if you memorize the powers of 2. More on reddit.com

I appreciate all the responses, it's my first day learning it, spent 3 hours doing it, but these comments are so confusing :D I'll read through them all and try and figure it out. More on reddit.com

Because 16 is a power of 2. So every 4 binary digits converts exactly to 1 hex digit. From the math perspective, you can pull out a 16x for every 4 binary digits. 0b1111 = 1 * 20 + 1 * 21 + 1 * 22 + 1 * 23 = 15 * 160 = 0xF If you do 0b1111 0000, you can pull out a 24 0b1111 0000 = 1 * 24 + 1 * 25 + 1 * 26 + 27 = 24 * (1 * 20 + 1 * 21 + 1 * 22 + 1 * 23 ) = 15 * 161 + 0 * 160 = 0xF0. 10 doesn't go into 16, so this doesn't work. It will however, work with 4s (every 2 binary digits) and 8s (every three binary digits) More on reddit.com

It's all about the base. Our natural counting is base 10. We start with 100 to count our '1s' 101 to count our '10s' 102 to count our '100s' So when you have a number say '321' you have (3) 102 = 300 (2) 101 = 20 (1) 100 = 1 Add those up and you get 321 Now let's move onto binary, same principle except our base is now 2 20 to count our '1s' 21 to count our '2s' 22 to count our '4s' 23 to count our '8s' 24 to count our '16s' So when you have a number in base 10 say '21' you have (1) 24 = 16 (0) 23 = 0 (1) 22 = 4 (0) 21 = 0 (1) 20 = 1 The binary equals 10101 which is 21 in base 10. Same thing for hex except use base 16. When using base 16 you can't go further than our '9' in decimal so you have to use the letter a-f to represent 10-15. So 10=A, 11=B, 12=C 160 to count our '1s' 161 to count our '16s' 162 to count our '256s' More on reddit.com