How to check SMD or surface mount resistances value from their code and test on multimeter

Test smd resistor using a multimeter

Digit code for smd resistors

Here is the video on this topic you can watch for further details:

Surface mount resistors or SMD resistors are very commonly used in electrical and electronics circuits. They are found everywhere in all electronics equipment today. They have certain value in resistance or Ohms which is mentioned on them in the form of a digital code. Here the following image is showing a surface mounted resistors circuit where you can see the SMD resistors and the rest of soldering on the PCB.

Her in this image you can see the surface mounted or SMD resistances with a digital code on them.

The resistors have a specific value code on them. This code is easy to learn and off course easy to print on the small and tiny body of an SMD resistor. This code consists of three digits or three value alfa numeric code is also used. Sometimes this could be a four digit code also in case of very high precision resistors. We will only discuss the three digit code here only. The three digit describes almost all possible resistors values normally used in consumer electronics or commercial electronics.

To understand the digital code for a surface mount resistor, we should see some resistors values examples and then will see their Ohm value to understand the code well.

First look at the following image to see the first resistor example:

You can see here 150 code resistor. There is code value 150 is printed on the SMD resistor body.

The value 150 we should have to understand how to decode. If we understand what 150 code value stands for, we will easily know what is the value for the certain resistor and then we will be able to test and evaluate this resistor with easily with the help of a multimeter.

how to test smd resistor with multimeter

In the code the first two digits will be considered as they are mentioned like in the above example they will be 15 and then the third digit represent the number of zeros in the end of the previous two digits. In the above example this is zero means no zeros at all. In other words the value will be 15R or 15 ohm. So if we may check this resistor, the meter must read value 15 ohm on the resistance range. But keep in mind there could be a 5 to 10% tolerance in the resistance value. So the resistance value will be close enough to the value mentioned on the resistor itself. Here in the blow image you can see the multimeter testing for the certain resistor under discussion.

Here we are testing a 150 code value SMD resistor on multimeter for resistance value and the meter reads 14.1R

Now we are testing another value resistor that is code value 684 mentioned on it. According to the resistor value decode it should be 68 and then 4 numbers of Zeros. That is 680000 R or ohm. So it is convenient to write is as 680K or 680 Kilo Ohm. here 1000 represent kilo. the below image is showing the detail of such resistor.

In the image you can see a 684 code value resistor as SMD component.

Next value we can see 1R5 resistor value. In such a value code we will change the central alphabetic value which is R in the below example with a point and shift the alphabet to the right of the digit. So in this case it will become 1.5R which is 1.5 ohm off course. It could be 1.5 K in case of 1K5.

here is 1R5 value code resistor. 1R5 means 1.5 Ohm resistor.

Here is the video on this topic you can watch for further details:

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