Polarity

[salvadorramos3k]

Can somebody please explain to me why CCl4 is nonpolar even though the dipole moments do not cancel out?

[505316964]

The dipole moments do cancel out, the shape is symmetrical, and the surrounding atoms are the same. Their dipoles point in the same direction, so they should cancel out making CCl4 nonpolar.

[Aman Sankineni 2L]

CCl4 has a tetrahedral shape that is symmetrical. Therefore, the bond polarity is canceled out.

[Madeline Phan 1E]

It is the symmetrical shape of carbon tetrachloride that allows its bond polarity to cancel out.

[quresh3E]

CCl4 has equal dipoles and no lone pairs so it should be nonpolar.

[Brian J Cheng 1I]

It's a symmetric molecule and has even distributions of electron density; thus, it is nonpolar.

[205154661_Dis2J]

For a molecule to be polar, it must possess a non-zero value of dipole moment. In the molecule CCl4, the bond polarity is canceled by the symmetric tetrahedral shape causing the dipole moment to be zero.

[Jacob Villar 2C]

Since CCl4 is a symmetrical tetrahedral shape, the dipole moments do cancel out.