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The Inductor
In our tutorials about Electromagnetism we saw that when an electrical current flows through a wire conductor, a magnetic flux is developed
around the conductor.

This produces a relationship between the direction of this magnetic flux which is circulating around the conductor and the
direction of the current flowing through the same conductor resulting in a well known relationship between current and
magnetic flux direction called, “Fleming’s Right Hand Rule”.

But there is also another important property relating to a wound coil that also exists, which is that a secondary voltage is induced
into the same coil by the movement of the magnetic flux as it opposes or resists any changes in the electrical current flowing it.

In its most basic form, an Inductor is nothing more than a coil of wire wound around a central core. For
most coils the current, ( i ) flowing through the coil produces a magnetic flux, ( NΦ ) around it that is
proportional to this flow of electrical current.

The Inductor, also called a choke, is another passive type electrical component which is just a coil of wire
that is designed to take advantage of this relationship by inducing a magnetic field in itself or in the core as
a result of the current passing through the coil. This results in a much stronger magnetic field than one that
would be produced by a simple coil of wire.
A Typical Inductor
Inductors are formed with wire tightly wrapped around a solid central core which can be either a straight
cylindrical rod or a continuous loop or ring to concentrate their magnetic flux.

The schematic symbol for a inductor is that of a coil of wire so therefore, a coil of wire can also be called an Inductor. Inductors
usually are categorised according to the type of inner core they are wound around, for example, hollow core (free air), solid iron
core or soft ferrite core with the different core types being distinguished by adding continuous or dotted parallel lines next to the
wire coil as shown below.

Inductor Symbols

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The current, i that flows through an inductor produces a magnetic flux that is proportional to it. But unlike a Capacitor which
oppose a change of voltage across their plates, an inductor opposes the rate of change of current flowing through it due to the
build up of self-induced energy within its magnetic field.

In other words, inductors resist or oppose changes of current but will easily pass a steady state DC current. This ability of an
inductor to resist changes in current and which also relates current, i with its magnetic flux linkage, NΦ as a constant of
proportionality is called Inductance which is given the symbol L with units of Henry, (H) after Joseph Henry.

Because the Henry is a relatively large unit of inductance in its own right, for the smaller inductors sub-units of the Henry are
used to denote its value. For example:

Inductance Prefixes

Prefix Symbol Multiplier Power of Ten

milli m 1/1,000 10-3

micro µ 1/1,000,000 10-6

nano n 1/1,000,000,000 10-9

So to display the sub-units of the Henry we would use as an example:

1mH = 1 milli-Henry – which is equal to one thousandths (1/1000) of an Henry.

100uH = 100 micro-Henries – which is equal to 100 millionth’s (1/1,000,000) of a Henry.

Inductors or coils are very common in electrical circuits and there are many factors which determine the inductance of a coil such
as the shape of the coil, the number of turns of the insulated wire, the number of layers of wire, the spacing between the turns, the
permeability of the core material, the size or cross-sectional area of the core etc, to name a few.

An inductor coil has a central core area, ( A ) with a constant number of turns of wire per unit length, ( l ). So if a coil of N turns is
linked by an amount of magnetic flux, Φ then the coil has a flux linkage of NΦ and any current, ( i ) that flows through the coil will
produce an induced magnetic flux in the opposite direction to the flow of current. Then according to Faraday’s Law, any change in
this magnetic flux linkage produces a self-induced voltage in the single coil of:
 Where:
N is the number of turns
A is the cross-sectional Area in m2
Φ is the amount of flux in Webers
μ is the Permeability of the core material
l is the Length of the coil in meters
di/dt is the Currents rate of change in amps/second

A time varying magnetic field induces a voltage that is proportional to the rate of change of the current producing it with a
positive value indicating an increase in emf and a negative value indicating a decrease in emf. The equation relating this self-
induced voltage, current and inductance can be found by substituting the μN2A / l with L denoting the constant of proportionality
called the Inductance of the coil.

The relation between the flux in the inductor and the current flowing through the inductor is given as: Φ = Li. As an inductor
consists of a coil of conducting wire, this then reduces the above equation to give the self-induced emf, sometimes called the back
emf induced in the coil too:

The back emf Generated by an Inductor

Where: L is the self-inductance and di/dt the rate of current change.

So from this equation we can say that the “self-induced emf = inductance x rate of current change” and a circuit
has an inductance of one Henry will have an emf of one volt induced in the circuit when the current flowing
through the circuit changes at a rate of one ampere per second.

One important point to note about the above equation. It only relates the emf produced across the inductor to
changes in current because if the flow of inductor current is constant and not changing such as in a steady state
DC current, then the induced emf voltage will be zero because the instantaneous rate of current change is zero,
di/dt = 0. Inductor
Coil
With a steady state DC current flowing through the inductor and therefore zero induced voltage across it, the
inductor acts as a short circuit equal to a piece of wire, or at the very least a very low value resistance. In other words, the
opposition to the flow of current offered by an inductor is very different between AC and DC circuits.

The Time Constant of an Inductor

We now know that the current can not change instantaneously in an inductor because for this to occur, the current would need
to change by a finite amount in zero time which would result in the rate of current change being infinite, di/dt = ∞, making the
induced emf infinite as well and infinite voltages do no exist. However, if the current flowing through an inductor changes very
rapidly, such as with the operation of a switch, high voltages can be induced across the inductors coil.

Consider the circuit of the inductor on the right. With the switch, ( S1 ) open, no current flows
through the inductor coil. As no current flows through the inductor, the rate of change of
current (di/dt) in the coil will be zero. If the rate of change of current is zero there is no self-
induced emf, ( VL = 0 ) within the inductor coil.

If we now close the switch (t = 0), a current will flow through the circuit and slowly rise to its
maximum value at a rate determined by the inductance of the inductor. This rate of current
flowing through the inductor multiplied by the inductors inductance in Henry’s, results in some
fixed value self-induced emf being produced across the coil as determined by Faraday’s equation above, VL = Ldi/dt.

This self-induced emf across the inductors coil, ( VL ) fights against the applied voltage until the current reaches its maximum
value and a steady state condition is reached. The current which now flows through the coil is determined only by the DC or
“pure” resistance of the coils windings as the reactance value of the coil has decreased to zero because the rate of change of
current (di/dt) is zero in steady state. In other words, only the coils DC resistance now exists to oppose the flow of current.

Likewise, if switch, (S1) is opened, the current flowing through the coil will start to fall but the inductor will again fight against this
change and try to keep the current flowing at its previous value by inducing a voltage in the other direction. The slope of the fall
will be negative and related to the inductance of the coil as shown below.

Current and Voltage in an Inductor

How much induced voltage will be produced by the inductor depends upon the rate of current change. In our tutorial about
Electromagnetic Induction, Lenz’s Law stated that: “the direction of an induced emf is such that it will always opposes the change
that is causing it”. In other words, an induced emf will always OPPOSE the motion or change which started the induced emf in the
first place.

So with a decreasing current the voltage polarity will be acting as a source and with an increasing current the voltage polarity will
be acting as a load. So for the same rate of current change through the coil, either increasing or decreasing the magnitude of the
induced emf will be the same.

Inductor Example No1

A steady state direct current of 4 ampere passes through a solenoid coil of 0.5H. What would be the back emf voltage induced in
the coil if the switch in the above circuit was opened for 10mS and the current flowing through the coil dropped to zero ampere.

Power in an Inductor
We know that an inductor in a circuit opposes the flow of current, ( i ) through it because the flow of this current induces an emf
that opposes it, Lenz’s Law. Then work has to be done by the external battery source in order to keep the current flowing against
this induced emf. The instantaneous power used in forcing the current, ( i ) against this self-induced emf, ( VL ) is given from above
as:
Power in a circuit is given as, P = V.I therefore:

An ideal inductor has no resistance only inductance so R = 0 Ω’s and therefore no power is dissipated within the coil, so we can
say that an ideal inductor has zero power loss.

Energy in an Inductor
When power flows into an inductor, energy is stored in its magnetic field. When the current flowing through the inductor is
increasing and di/dt becomes greater than zero, the instantaneous power in the circuit must also be greater than zero, ( P > 0 ) ie,
positive which means that energy is being stored in the inductor.

Likewise, if the current through the inductor is decreasing and di/dt is less than zero then the instantaneous power must also be
less than zero, ( P < 0 ) ie, negative which means that the inductor is returning energy back into the circuit. Then by integrating the
equation for power above, the total magnetic energy which is always positive, being stored in the inductor is therefore given as:

Energy stored by an Inductor

Where: W is in joules, L is in Henries and i is in Amperes

The energy is actually being stored within the magnetic field that surrounds the inductor by the current flowing through it. In an
ideal inductor that has no resistance or capacitance, as the current increases energy flows into the inductor and is stored there
within its magnetic field without loss, it is not released until the current decreases and the magnetic field collapses.

Then in an alternating current, AC circuit an inductor is constantly storing and delivering energy on each and every cycle. If the
current flowing through the inductor is constant as in a DC circuit, then there is no change in the stored energy as P = Li(di/dt) = 0.

So inductors can be defined as passive components as they can both stored and deliver energy to the circuit, but they cannot
generate energy. An ideal inductor is classed as loss less, meaning that it can store energy indefinitely as no energy is lost.

However, real inductors will always have some resistance associated with the windings of the coil and whenever current flows
through a resistance energy is lost in the form of heat due to Ohms Law, ( P = I2 R ) regardless of whether the current is alternating
or constant.

Then the primary use for inductors is in filtering circuits, resonance circuits and for current limiting. An inductor can be used in
circuits to block or reshape alternating current or a range of sinusoidal frequencies, and in this role an inductor can be used to
“tune” a simple radio receiver or various types of oscillators. It can also protect sensitive equipment from destructive voltage
spikes and high inrush currents.

In the next tutorial about Inductors, we will see that the effective resistance of a coil is called Inductance, and that inductance
which as we now know is the characteristic of an electrical conductor that “opposes a change in the current”, can either be
internally induced, called self-inductance or externally induced, called mutual-inductance.

Next
Inductance of a Coil
83 Comments

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M Manikanta badiger
How to calculate inductor output with respect to input

Posted on December 15th 2017 | 4:48 pm

 Reply

l lovepreet singh
Can help me to solve one question about back emf

Posted on December 01st 2017 | 8:35 am

 Reply

j james
thanks for the help guys!!!!!!!!!!

Posted on November 28th 2017 | 3:07 pm

 Reply
 J Jeremy
I don’t understand how you can suddenly throw in a negative sign into your Voltage across the Inductor equation. You say V_L = dphi/dt =
dLi/dt = (-)L di/dt. You can’t mathematically just switch polarities unless your convention has changed. It would help to show voltage polarity
on a drawing.

Posted on October 14th 2017 | 5:53 pm

 Reply

M Milan Perera
The explanation is superb..
We have 4mH inductors with current flow is about 710A in our wind power applications and i’m undergoing a research to troubleshoot some
errors related with it. And your document was really helpful and specially it is described briefly..
good job…

Posted on September 29th 2017 | 4:38 am

 Reply

M Maria
Could you, please, explain one problem I can’t solve myself?
I can’t understand : We have solenoid length ‘l’, cross section of the solenoid ‘S’, he number of turns ‘N’, and we have the current in this circuit
‘i’ . And the question is: what average induced EMF in solenoid will be after ‘t’ – seconds after we switched off the current? I am able to
calculate inductance L or magnetic flux density B, BUT i don’t know the change of the current! How can i calculate the current change if i don’t
know anything about resistance R, or frequency w, etc? What is the current after ‘t’ – seconds?
Be so kind, tell me, please)

Posted on September 24th 2017 | 6:07 pm

 Reply

D Deepak gond
nice

Posted on September 07th 2017 | 12:51 pm

 Reply

V Vincent James
I found this tutorial on inductor very interesting. Please what factor affecting the economy can one compare the effect of an
inductor/inductance to in an electric circuit, please an insight to this will be very helpful because in will help me in my research work

Posted on July 24th 2017 | 11:09 am

 Reply

Professor B N Biswas
I am facing a paradox.
P
Posted on July 06th 2017 | 12:20 pm
 Reply

A Aniket S Naphade
If a current of 5 A flowing through a coil of 0.1 H reverses in 10 msec, what will be the emf induced in coil?

Posted on March 26th 2017 | 1:13 pm

 Reply

Wayne Storr
50 volts, you can do the maths.

Posted on March 26th 2017 | 4:17 pm

 Reply

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Read more Tutorials in Inductors

 1. The Inductor
2. Inductance of a Coil
3. Mutual Inductance
4. Inductors in Series
5. Inductors in Parallel
6. LR Series Circuit
7. Inductive Reactance
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