How to use Faradium: the beginner’s guide

Quick start

Faradium is a free virtual science lab that runs in your browser. Nothing to install, no account needed, and nothing can break or catch fire. Experiment as much as you like.

Chemistry Lab: screen tour

The Chemistry Lab has five areas. Learn these once and everything else is easy.

1. Top bar: rename the experiment, open Verdict or the Notebook, or start a Teaching demo. ⋯ More holds Save, Open, Clear, Settings (speed, labels), Share and Help.
2. Moving panels: drag any panel by its top bar. The guided steps can go anywhere on screen, and the minimise button turns them into a small badge you can tap to bring them back. On phones, drag the top of the Add, object and Notebook sheets to any height, or tap the corners icon for full screen.
3. Workbench: the big grey area. Apparatus sits on the bench; drag things around with the mouse.
4. Properties panel: appears on the left when you click an object. It shows the volume, temperature, pH and contents, plus buttons like Stir, Ignite, Pour and gas tests.
5. Drawer (right): everything you can use. The left column has categories (Reaction vessel, Assistive devices, Solid, Liquid and Gas chemicals). Below them, A–Z letters filter the list. Use the search box to find anything. The little ‹ tab hides or shows the drawer.
6. Bottom tools: zoom (click the % to pick a size, ⌖ to reset), pause/play, speed (1×, 2×, 4×, 8×), zoom in, and delete.

Your first experiment

Let's do a classic experiment: an iron nail in copper sulfate solution. It takes about one minute.

1. Open the Chemistry lab from the top menu.
2. In the drawer, make sure Reaction vessel is selected, then click Beaker 100 mL. It appears on the bench. (You can also drag it to a spot you like.)
3. Click the Liquid chemicals category, then click Copper(II) sulfate. A bar appears at the bottom saying "Adding Copper(II) sulfate".
4. In that bar, choose 25 mL, then click the beaker. Blue solution pours in.
5. Click Solid chemical, click Iron nail / filings, choose 2 g, then click the beaker again.
6. Press Esc to stop adding. Now watch: the nail turns copper-coloured and the blue fades to green. Click Stir in the properties panel to speed it up.
7. Click Notebook in the top bar to read what happened, with the balanced equation.

Adding apparatus & chemicals

Placing apparatus

1. Click any glassware or tool in the drawer to drop it in a free spot, or drag it onto the bench.
2. Drag objects to move them. Click one to select it (blue outline) and open its properties panel.
3. To remove something, select it and press Delete or click the 🗑 button.

Adding chemicals: two easy ways

Heating & cooling

1. From Assistive devices, add a Spirit burner (gentle heat) or Bunsen burner (strong heat).
2. Drag a vessel onto the tripod above the burner. It snaps into place.
3. Light the burner: double-click it, or select it and click Light burner.
4. Watch the temperature rise in the properties panel, or add a Thermometer by dragging it onto the vessel.
5. To cool something quickly, place an Ice bath and drag the vessel into it.

Measuring: pH, temperature, contents

Click any vessel. The properties panel shows:

• Volume, Temp and pH: live gauges, plus a colour bar showing where the pH sits on the 0–14 scale.
• Contents: every substance inside, with its state: aq dissolved, s solid/precipitate, gas, and its concentration or mass.
• Observations: what you'd see, written for you (colour changes, bubbles, precipitates), with balanced equations.

For readings right on the bench, drag a pH meter or Thermometer from Assistive devices onto a vessel.

Stirring, pouring & filtering

Collecting & testing gases

Collecting a gas

1. Set up the reaction vessel (e.g. marble chips + hydrochloric acid in a conical flask).
2. Add a second vessel: a Gas jar to collect gas, or a test tube of Limewater to test for CO₂.
3. Select the reaction vessel, open Gas tube to… and choose the second vessel. A delivery tube connects them and gas flows across.

Gas tests: select the vessel, then click a test

Flame tests, electrolysis, titration

🌈 Flame test

1. Add and light a Bunsen burner.
2. Select a vessel containing a metal salt (e.g. sodium chloride).
3. Click Flame test: the burner flame shows the metal's colour (Na yellow, K lilac, Li red, Cu blue-green…).

⚡ Electrolysis

1. Add the Electrolysis cell (Hofmann).
2. Fill it with at least 40 mL of an electrolyte, e.g. sodium sulfate, brine or copper chloride.
3. Select it and click Power ON. Gas collects above each electrode, and you can test each gas with the buttons provided.

🧪 Titration

1. Put the acid in a conical flask and add 1 mL of phenolphthalein.
2. Add a Burette and drag it onto the flask.
3. Select the burette: choose the titrant (e.g. NaOH 0.1 M) and the flow rate.
4. Click Open stopcock. Watch the live pH curve, and close it the moment the colour turns pink.

Teaching demos, notebook & saving

• Teaching demo (top-right) lists 22 guided experiments: golden rain, elephant's toothpaste, electrolysis, titration, flame tests and more. Each one sets up the bench and shows a step checklist that ticks itself off. Click Show the chemistry to learn the science.
• Verdict explains every result. When something finishes, a small card pops up: tap it to see the reactants, products and spectator ions, why it happened, and, if nothing happened, exactly why not. The physics labs have it too. Turn on Predict mode inside the panel to guess the outcome before each mix.
• Notebook records every observation and equation with a timestamp. Click Copy to paste it into your lab report.
• Save stores your bench in this browser; Open brings it back later. Clear starts fresh.
• Click the experiment name in the top bar to rename it.

Physics Lab: circuits

1. Open Physics and choose Electricity.
2. Click a component in the drawer (battery, bulb, switch…), then click the grid to place it.
3. Connect parts by making their end dots touch on the same grid point. Drag an end dot to stretch or turn a part; drag the middle to move it. Use Wire to join parts that are far apart.
4. A complete loop lights bulbs and moves the charge dots. Click a Switch to open or close it.
5. Click any part to see its current, voltage and power, and change values with sliders (battery voltage, resistance…).

Physics Lab: optics

1. Open Physics and choose Optics.
2. Click a light source (laser, white light, beam) and click the bench to place it. Add lenses, mirrors, prisms or glass blocks the same way.
3. Drag an element to move it. Select it, then drag the round handle to rotate (hold Shift to snap to 15°), or use the mouse wheel over it.
4. The left panel shows angles of incidence and refraction, the critical angle, and whether total internal reflection is happening.

Using the simulations

1. Open Simulations and pick a topic (filter by Physics, Chemistry, Biology or Math, or search).
2. Use the controls on the right: sliders, checkboxes and buttons change the experiment live.
3. Many simulations let you drag things directly on the screen (pendulum bobs, charges, vectors, track points).
4. The bottom bar has Pause/Play, Step (one frame at a time), Speed and Reset.

Shortcuts

Troubleshooting & FAQ