Discuss different types of electrolytes.

Depending upon the degree of ionisation, there are two types of electrolytes.
(i) Strong electrolyte: A substance which dissociates almost completely into ions in its aqueous solution is known as strong electrolyte". Even though the amount of strong electrolyte may be small, the concentration of ions in aqueous solution is high and thus electrical conductivity is also high e.g. HCl, HNO₃, H₂SO₄, NaOH, KOH, NaCl, NaNO₃. There is no equilibrium in their aqueous solutions since only a few molecules may be unionised. Their ionised form may be rep- resented as,

(ii) Weak electrolyte: A substance which dissociates to a small extent in its aqueous solution is known as a weak electrolyte. Even though the amount of weak electrolyte may be large, the concentration of ions in solution is low and thus electrical conductivity is-low, for example, HF, H₂CO₃, H₂C₂O₄, H₃PO₄, CH₃COOH, HCN. Since weak electrolytes are feebly ionised in their aqueous solution, an equilibrium is set up between the ion3 and unionised electrolyte. For example.