Recently, we’ve been studying electricity at school and one thing I’m incredibly confused about is voltage. When I try to find explanations, I find people using analogies to give a basic idea but actually not explain what it is?
So far, I believe that Voltage acts like a pushing force force the current to flow. Is this correct? or Is there anything I’m missing.
In: Physics
Voltage is like height with gravity.
With gravity if you have a height difference, things (with mass) will generally try to fall from the higher one to the lower one. You have to put in energy to lift something up to a higher height, and you get out energy when things fall down to a lower height.
Voltage – or potential difference – is the electricity version of height (almost). If you have a 9V potential difference between two points in a circuit, current will flow from the higher p.d. to the lower one (obviously the electrons will go the other way, thanks charge convention).
The bigger the potential difference the more energy you will get out when the current drops between them.
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Voltage, or potential, is a bit of a weird concept because it doesn’t exist in any real sense, which is why we have to use analogies. It is a mathematical tool to help understand how things work.
Potential can be defined in a couple of ways, either as the amount of energy needed to move a thing of unit charge between the two points, or it can be defined in terms of the underlying (force) field.
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