How do you find the slope of x-3y= -3?

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Answer 1 · 2015-08-21T11:53:26

$m = 1/3$

You can find the slope of this line by rearranging the equation to math slope-intercept form, which for a general form line looks like this

$color(blue)(y = mx + b)$

Your equation looks like this

$x - 3y = -3$

Start by moving $x$ to the right-hand side of the equation

$-3y = -x - 3$

Now divide both sides of the equation by $-3$ to get $y$ alone on the left-hand side

$(color(red)(cancel(color(black)((-3)))) * y)/color(red)(cancel(color(black)((-3)))) = ((-1))/((-3))x + ((-3))/((-3))$

$y = 1/3x + 1$

Compare this euqation to the general form slope-intercept form to get the value of the slope, which in your case is

$m = color(green)(1/3)$