covalent

UK/kəʊˈveɪ.lənt/US/koʊˈveɪ.lənt/

adjectiveC1Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #13,870 of 15,258mostly written

Covalent means bonded by sharing electrons between atoms. A covalent bond, covalent compounds, covalently linked.

Sharing rather than giving is the whole difference from an ionic bond, and it is why covalent substances do not conduct electricity and melt at lower temperatures. Everything alive is built on them — carbon forms four covalent bonds, which is why life is carbon-based.

Definitions of covalent

1adjectivecovalentBonded by sharing electrons between atoms.C1
“In a water molecule, each hydrogen atom is held to the oxygen by a covalent bond.”

covalent is a kind of chemical bond.

Where it comes from

From co- + valent.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Chemistry & Elements

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covalent in the wild

A covalent bond is a chemical bond that involves the sharing of electrons to form electron pairs between atoms.
Covalent bond
The stable balance of attractive and repulsive forces between atoms, when they share electrons, is known as covalent bonding.
Covalent bond
Bonds with partially ionic and partially covalent characters are called polar covalent bonds.
Ionic bonding
The covalent radius, rcov, is a measure of the size of an atom that forms part of one covalent bond.
Covalent radius
In principle, the sum of the two covalent radii should equal the covalent bond length between two atoms, R(AB) = r(A) + r(B).
Covalent radius

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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