Science Common Sense

1739 - What is the difference between an ideal gas and a real gas?

Imagine you have a balloon filled with air. The air in the balloon is made up of tiny molecules moving around. Now, there are two types of gases: ideal gases and real gases.

An ideal gas is like a perfect world where the molecules don't interact with each other, they just bounce around freely. They don't have any attraction or repulsion to each other. It's like they're all alone in space.

A real gas, on the other hand, is like the real world where the molecules do interact with each other. They can attract or repel each other, and they can even stick together a bit. This means that real gases behave a bit differently than ideal gases.

In short, ideal gases are like perfect, non-interacting molecules, while real gases are like real molecules that interact with each other.