Charges and Fields: Electric Field & Voltage
Place positive and negative charges, drag them, and see electric field arrows and voltage colours with a live sensor.
Add positive and negative charges, then drag them around. Arrows show the electric field. Drag the yellow sensor to read the field and voltage anywhere.
About the Charges and Fields: Electric Field & Voltage
Free charges and fields: electric field & voltage. Place positive and negative charges, drag them, and see electric field arrows and voltage colours with a live sensor. Drag, change the sliders and see the result live. No sign-up, works on phone and computer. Built for physics, the charges and fields: electric field & voltage runs instantly in your browser: change a setting or drag an object and the result updates at once, so you learn by trying things out rather than only reading about them.
Place positive and negative charges, drag them, and see electric field arrows and voltage colours with a live sensor. Use it to explore physics ideas at your own pace, then check what you found against the key ideas further down this page.
How to use the Charges and Fields: Electric Field & Voltage
- Pick an option such as Field arrows, Voltage colours, Both to switch modes or load an example.
- Press "+ Positive charge", "− Negative charge", "Clear all" to start, reset or change what is happening.
- Where you see a glowing handle, object, weight or atom, drag it with your mouse or finger. Everything responds in real time.
- Watch the readouts and graphs update as you experiment, and compare what you see with the key ideas below.
Things to try
- Make a dipole with one + and one −.
- Add several charges in a line.
- Show voltage colours.
Key ideas you can learn
- Field arrows point away from positive and toward negative charges.
- Field is strongest close to the charges.
- Voltage is high near positive charges and low near negative.
- Field and voltage can be measured with a sensor.
Where this is used in the real world
Electric fields are used in inkjet printers, particle accelerators, capacitors and sensors.
Who is this simulation for?
Physics students in middle school, high school and first-year university, teachers who want a quick demonstration for the projector, and anyone revising for exams. It works well for flipped classrooms because students can explore before the lesson.
For teachers: project it on the board, let students predict what will happen, then run it together. For students: change one thing at a time and write down what changes.
Frequently asked questions
What is an electric field?
The force per unit charge that a small positive test charge would feel at each point.
How are field and voltage related?
The field points in the direction the voltage drops fastest.
Is the Charges and Fields: Electric Field & Voltage free to use?
Yes. It is completely free, with no signup, no download and no ads inside the simulation. It runs in your web browser.
Does the Charges and Fields: Electric Field & Voltage work on a phone or tablet?
Yes. It uses touch as well as the mouse, so you can drag objects with your finger. A larger screen makes the controls easier to see.