This chart ranks chemical elements by electronegativity on the Pauling scale, a measure of how strongly an atom pulls on shared electrons in a chemical bond. Fluorine is the most electronegative element. Noble gases are excluded.

About: Most Electronegative Chemical Elements

Overview of the data behind this chart

AI Insight

Fluorine tops the Pauling scale at 3.98, making it the most electronegative element and the benchmark against which the scale is defined. Oxygen (3.44), chlorine (3.16) and nitrogen (3.04) follow, and together these four electron-hungry non-metals drive much of chemistry, from water to DNA. Electronegativity then falls steadily: bromine (2.96) and iodine (2.66) trail their lighter halogen relatives, reflecting the periodic trend that electronegativity decreases down a group. A striking entry is gold (2.54), the most electronegative metal, sitting alongside carbon and selenium near the bottom of this top ten. The tight clustering of values between 2.5 and 3.0 shows how narrowly separated most reactive non-metals are once fluorine and oxygen are set aside.

Data source: Pauling Electronegativity Scale

Key Findings

Auto-computed highlights from this dataset

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Fluorine leads with 4 in All Time.

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Average value in All Time: 3 · median: 3.

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Gap in All Time: Fluorine is 1.6× larger than Gold.

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Most Electronegative Chemical Elements

Data Insights Below

Data Insights

Numbers, trends & sources behind this chart

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Data Points

10 categories · 1 year

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Top Value

3.98

Fluorine

Electronegativity (Pauling scale) · All Time

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Metrics

Electronegativity (Pauling scale)

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Period

All Time

Single year snapshot

Category Rankings

Electronegativity (Pauling scale) · All Time

#	Category	All Time
🥇	Fluorine	3.98
🥈	Oxygen	3.44
🥉	Chlorine	3.16
4	Nitrogen	3.04
5	Bromine	2.96
6	Iodine	2.66
7	Sulfur	2.58
8	Selenium	2.55
9	Carbon	2.55
10	Gold	2.54

Statistical Summary — Electronegativity (Pauling scale) · All Time

3.98

Maximum

2.54

Minimum

Average

Median

What This Data Shows

Auto-generated trend summaries per category

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Fluorine

Recorded 3.98 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

Source

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Oxygen

Recorded 3.44 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

Source

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Chlorine

Recorded 3.16 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

Source

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Nitrogen

Recorded 3.04 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

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Bromine

Recorded 2.96 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

Source

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Iodine

Recorded 2.66 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

Source

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Sulfur

Recorded 2.58 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

Source

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Selenium

Recorded 2.55 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

Source

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Carbon

Recorded 2.55 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

Source

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Gold

Recorded 2.54 Electronegativity (Pauling scale) in All Time.

Source

Full Data Table

10 records across 1 year

10 sourced

Category	Metric	All Time
Fluorine	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	3.98
Oxygen	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	3.44
Chlorine	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	3.16
Nitrogen	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	3.04
Bromine	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	2.96
Iodine	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	2.66
Sulfur	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	2.58
Selenium	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	2.55
Carbon	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	2.55
Gold	Electronegativity (Pauling scale)	2.54