How is the order of elements decided when talking about compounds?

Question

For example, why is it NaCl instead of ClNa?

In: 2

Answer 1

It depends on the type of compound.

Sodium chloride is an ionic compound. Ionic compounds are named by first saying the cation (positive ion) and then the anion (negative ion). In sodium chloride, sodium is the cation and chlorine is the anion, thus: NaCl.

There is a process for covalent and metallic compounds as well, but they have more steps so I’m going to leave it at “they exist” for this post. I’m not a chemist, I’ve just taken a few chem classes, so I don’t think I can reduce it very well for ELI5 but I hope somebody else does!