Visualizing Avogadro's Number

This activity is designed to help you grasp just how huge Avogadro's number really is.

Here's what's going on step-by-step:

What "1 mole" means

• 1 mole of water = 6.022 × 10²³ molecules
• That's about 602 sextillion molecules

What happens when you click the button

At first:

• Each click adds 1 molecule

Then it speeds up:

• 1,000 molecules
• 1,000,000 (1 million)
• 1,000,000,000 (1 billion)
• . . . and so on

Eventually:

• You'll be adding around 10 sextillion (10 × 10²¹) molecules per click

Why it ramps up

If it didn't speed up, you'd need over 600 sextillion clicks. So the animation increases the amount per click exponentially to make it doable.

What you should notice

• Even when adding sextillions at a time, it still takes many clicks
• This shows how unimaginably large 6.022 × 10²³ really is

When you're done

You'll have transferred:

• 1 mole of water
• Mass = 18.015 grams
• Volume ≈ 18.015 mL