Forward vs. Reverse

[Melissa Solis 1H]

Can someone please explain how to identify forward and reverse processes?

[LReedy_3C]

I think it's just relative to the way the reaction is presented to you

[Kelly Tran 1J]

If the forward reaction is R (reactants) --> P (products), the reverse reaction would be P --> R.

[Jeffrey Doeve 2I]

Forward processes are the reactions read from left to right, while reverse processes are reactions read from right to left. With this in mind, we can consider forward reactions to be the reactants forming the products, while the reverse reaction is the products forming the reactants. Hope this helps!

[Mahnoor_Wani_1I]

I agree with the post above. Usually, one process is spontaneous while the other is not. Also, reactants --> product is forward while products --> reactants are reverse depending of the info given about what are the products and reactants.

[Gina Spagarino 3G]

I noticed that of the questions on weeks 5/6 used the wording "as written" and "opposite as written" instead of "forward" and "reverse"

[Evelyn Silva 3J]

Products to reactants (left-->right) is the forward reaction and reactants to products (right-->left) is the reverse reaction.

[Kiara Phillips 3L]

Often, they will say left to right or right to left. Or "the reaction proceeds in the forward/reverse direction."

[Zainab Jamali 1H]

The way the reaction is presented to you in the problem would generally be the forward reaction (unless stated otherwise). So if that reaction is reactants --> products, then its reverse is products --> reactants. Hope this helps :)

[SamanthaTolentino 3D]

The forward reaction is when reactants are turned into products meanwhile the reverse reaction would be the breaking down of products into reactants.

[Rose_Malki_3G]

Forward reactions are when the reaction goes from reactants to products and reverse reaction is when the process goes from products to reactants

[dana hu 1B]

The forward reaction is the direction of reactants to products (left to right).
The reverse is products producing reactants (backward direction)

[Joshua Chung 2D]

A reaction moves forward from left to right (as given to you). Since the reactants are on the left and the products are on the right, a forward reaction is R —> P. Thus, the reverse of the same reaction moves from right to left, or P —> R.

[Can Yilgor 2D]

I agree with what others have said above. Just to provide a different perspective, when the forward reaction is favored, the concentrations of products increase, while the concentrations of reactants decrease. When the reverse reaction is favored, the concentrations of the products decrease, while the concentrations of reactants increase.

[Mansi Solanki 3A]

A reaction is determined to be forward or reverse based on the direction that it is in when being present with a chemical equation.
For instance if the chemical equation is A + B --> C + D, then A + B --> C + D is the forward reaction and C + D --> A + B is the reverse reaction.

[DavidTabib 3H]

The reverse of a reaction is flipping the reactants and the products.

[tholz11]

Forward and Reverse reactions should be, as was said earlier in the responses, relative to how the equation is presented to you. So if they give you
A -> B
The reverse would be
B -> A

[Kiara Phillips 3L]

Sometimes they will say left to right or right to left. Or they will tel you what the products or reactants are and you can work from that. Generally, I recommend doing practice problems because getting familiar with the wording is key in being efficient on an exam. Hope this helps!

[Joshua Eidam 2A]

You can think of it as if it were reading a book for example. You go left to right. So the same thing applies to a reaction. The forward reaction will be how it is presented to you and read left to right. The reverse would be the same reaction but from right to left. Additionally, when looking at a reaction profile, it is the same thing. The forward reaction will be going left to right and the reverse will be going from right to left. Hope this helps!

[Diana Aguilar 3H]

Hi! A forward reaction is from reactants to products (A->B) so it moves from left to right and a reverse reaction is from products to reactants (B->A) so it moves from right to left.

[Nishan Reddy 3K]

It is usually dependent of how a given reaction is given to you. They may see that a forward reaction is spontaneous which means it has a negative G value but usually the forward and reverse will be told to you.

[Alekhya_Pantula_2E]

Forward reactions are where the rxn moves in the direction of reactants to products. Reverse reactions are where the rxn moves from products to reactants.

[Brianna Cronyn Lec3E]

Forward and reverse are part of reversible reactions in which the reaction can go both directions. Which one is forward and which is reverse is defined by the order it is written out as in the reaction. To identify which is forward and which is reverse, that is where you'd usually want to refer to. If that is not given, there would likely be clues as to figure out which way.