Calculate the speed of an electron accelerated through a potential difference (voltage).
Acceleration
Velocity Results
Enter accelerating voltage
Quick Reference
VAccelerating Voltage
e1.602 × 10⁻¹⁹ C
m9.109 × 10⁻³¹ kg
c299,792,458 m/s
Overview
When an electron is placed in an electric field created by a potential difference (voltage), it gains kinetic energy. This calculator finds the resulting speed, considering both classical and relativistic physics.
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Pro Tips
Classical Formula: v = sqrt(2 * e * V / m).
Relativistic effects become significant above about 10,000 Volts.
The speed can never exceed the speed of light (c ≈ 3 × 10⁸ m/s).
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Fun Facts
"In a traditional CRT television, electrons are accelerated by about 25,000 Volts, reaching roughly 30% of the speed of light."
"At the Large Hadron Collider, particles reach 99.9999991% of the speed of light."
"Even at 1 Volt, an electron travels at about 593 km/s!"
