^[1]Measured by making a cube of the material, one meter on each side, and putting very conductive metal such as silver on two opposite faces, to serve as electrodes. An ohmmeter is attached to those electrodes, and the resist ance will then also be the resist ivity. If the material was longer, but still the same width and thickness, then the resist ance would be greater, but the resist ivity would still be the same, since it is only defined for a cube. Similarly, if the material was wider or thicker, the resistance would be less. This is somewhat analogous to density, which is defined for a cubic centimeter, and a larger volume of that material would weigh more but still have the same density as a small volume.

Of course, it is just a coincidence that the measurement unit, ohm-meter, looks similar to the word for the instrument, ohmmeter. It should be noted that older tables often list the resistivities in ohm- centimeters, rather than in ohm-meters.