Sine, Cosine and Tangent - Math is Fun Sine, Cosine and Tangent (often shortened to sin, cos and tan) are each a ratio of sides of a right angled triangle: To calculate them: Divide the length of one side by another side Example: What is the sine of 35°? Using this triangle (lengths are only to one decimal place): = 0 57 = 0 82 = 0 70