Introduction to Voltage Dividers

Or: How to get “There” from “Here”

By DK Merriman (dkmerriman@gmail.com)

One of the hazards of working in a digital world, such as computers and microcontrollers, is that the
Real World isn't composed of the convenient ones and zeros of binary numbers.

It often happens that we need to read or measure one of those awkward analog values that clutter things
up. This isn't too much of a problem, itself – we have analog-to-digital converters to do the grunt-work
for us. Still, even A/D converters are limited to a maximum input – typically, something along the lines
of 5 volts. That's sometimes considerably less than is convenient; we may need to measure 12 volts, or
13.8, or something even higher.

That's where our friend the Voltage Divider comes in. As the name implies, it divides one voltage down
to something else – preferably something we can input to our A/D converter. So how do we know how
much of a voltage divider we need? And more importantly, how to make it? That's what this little
article is about.

A voltage divider is typically described as a ratio: two-to-one (2:1), three-to-one (3:1), five-to-three
(5:3), and so on. It's common to see the ratio given as something-to-one, but it's sometimes useful to
express it as something else: 1.25:1 is the same as 5:4, for example.

To figure out how much of a divider you need, simply divide the “input” value (the one you're trying to
measure) by the desired peak input to your measuring circuit. Thus, if you need to measure a 15V
supply voltage, and your A/D converter has a maximum input of 5V, then you need:
15 / 5 = 3 for a 3:1 voltage divider. So what combination of resistors (the common method of creating
a voltage divider) do you use?

The ratio of a voltage divider is the relationship

between the total of the resistors, and the value
of the “output” resistor:
So to get our 3:1 voltage divider, using the circuit above, R1 has to be twice the value of R2.
Remember, the ratio is the total of ALL the resistors to the output, so R1 plus R2 has to equal the “3”
of 3:1. That makes R1 equal to 2K.

So what to do if our desired ratio was 3:2? Simple: just divide the output value into the input value to
get a “multiplier”. 3/2 is 1.5, so whatever value we select for R2, R1 has to be 1.5 times that; using our
reference circuit again, R1 would be 1.5K. What would R1 have to be if somebody gave us a 5.1K
resistor to use as R2 in a 9:7 divider?

The last thing to address is how accurate our divider is going to be. If you try to create voltage dividers
with 10%, or even 5%, resistors, you're going to find that the ratios don't always (seldom, in fact) work
out properly. In that case, you've basically got three options:
1. Go with a divider that outputs less than nominal voltage, and scale your reading from that (that
is, instead of a 5V output, you have 4.8V – just use 4.8 as 100%, and scale from there). This is
the cheapest and easiest, but least accurate.
2. Include a potentiometer (ideally multi-turn for greater precision) in one leg, and adjust for
optimum output (best to use a smaller resistor and a potentiometer where the approximate mid-
range gives you the total you want). A little more expensive than just using fixed resistors, but
possibly worth it, depending on your needs. Still not the most accurate, but better.
3. Use 1% (or better) resistors. The advantage of using 1% resistors is that it's almost always
possible to find a combination that gives you the desired ratio, because of the different
“stepping” used in precision resistors. For example, a 10:1 ratio is pretty tough using 5%
values; the 1% values of 9.09K and 909 ohms is ideal. The downside of this is that the higher
the precision of the resistor, the more expensive it is.

Hopefully, this brief article has given you some guidance on how to interface your digital project to an
analog world. For your convenience, I am including the stepping for different tolerances of resistors on
the following pages; if you downloaded this document as part of a zip file, there will also be plain-text
files for the data, as well.
10% tolerance resistors are “stepped” as follows:

10
12
15
18
22
27
33
39
47
56
68
82
(after 82 ohms, the next would be 100, 120, etc)
5% tolerance resistor stepping

10
11
12
13
15
16
18
20
22
24
27
30
33
36
39
43
47
51
56
62
68
75
82
91
2% tolerance stepping
10 22.1 48.7
10.2 22.6 49.9
10.5 23.2 51.1
10.7 23.7 52.3
11 24.3 53.6
11.3 24.9 54.9
11.5 25.5 56.2
11.8 26.1 57.6
12.1 26.7 59
12.4 27.4 60.4
12.7 28 61.9
13 28.7 63.4
13.3 29.4 64.9
13.7 30.1 65.5
14 30.9 68.1
14.3 31.6 69.8
14.7 32.4 71.5
15 33.2 73.2
15.4 34 75
15.8 34.8 76.8
16.2 35.7 78.7
16.5 36.5 80.6
16.9 37.4 82.5
17.4 38.3 84.5
17.8 39.2 86.6
18.2 40.2 88.7
18.7 41.2 90.9
19.1 42.2 93.1
19.6 43.2 95.3
20 44.2 97.6
20.5 45.3
21 46.4
21.5 47.5
1% tolerance 14.5 21.5 32 47.5 70.6
stepping 14.7 21.8 32.4 48.1 71.5
10 14.9 22.1 32.8 48.7 72.3
10.1 15 22.3 33.2 49.3 73.2
10.2 15.2 22.6 33.6 49.9 74.1
10.4 15.4 22.9 34 50.5 75
10.5 15.6 23.2 34.4 51.1 75.9
10.6 15.8 24.4 34.8 51.7 76.8
10.7 16 23.7 35.2 52.3 77.7
10.9 16.2 24 35.7 53 78.7
11 16.4 24.3 36.1 53.6 79.6
11.1 16.5 24.6 36.5 54.2 80.6
11.3 16.7 24.9 37 54.9 81.6
11.4 16.9 25.2 37.4 55.6 82.5
11.5 17.2 25.5 37.9 56.2 83.5
11.7 17.4 25.8 38.3 56.9 84.5
11.8 17.6 26.1 38.8 57.6 85.6
12 17.8 26.4 39.2 58.3 86.6
12.1 18 26.7 39.7 59 87.6
12.3 18.2 27.1 40.2 59.7 88.7
12.4 18.4 27.4 40.7 60.4 89.8
12.6 18.7 27.7 41.2 61.2 90.9
12.7 18.9 28 41.7 61.9 92
12.9 19.1 28.4 42.2 62.9 93.1
13 19.3 28.7 42.7 63.4 94.2
13.2 19.6 29.1 43.2 64.2 95.3
13.3 19.8 29.4 43.7 64.9 96.5
13.5 20 29.8 44.2 65.7 97.6
13.7 20.3 30.1 44.8 65.5 98.8
13.8 20.5 30.5 45.3 67.3
14 20.8 30.9 45.9 68.1
14.2 21 31.2 46.4 69
14.3 21.3 31.6 47 69.8