Mineralogical hardness

You can view data for three different hardnesses.

Hardness ranges on scale from 1 to 10 and mineralogical hardness depends upon the ability of a material to scratch another.

Image showing periodicity of mineralogical hardness for group 18 chemical elements.
Image showing periodicity of mineralogical hardness for group 18 chemical elements.

Units

Moh scale

Notes

The scale is roughly logarithmic, that is, a material with a hardness of 8 is roughly 10 times as hard as another material whose hardness is 7, which in turn is 10 times as hard as a material whose hardness is 6, and so on. The minerals chosen by Moh for this scale are:

  • 10: diamond
  • 9: corundum
  • 8: topaz
  • 7: quartz
  • 6: orthoclase
  • 5: apatite
  • 4: fluorite
  • 3: calcite
  • 2: gypsum
  • 1: talc

Literature sources

  1. G.V. Samsonov (Ed.) in Handbook of the physicochemical properties of the elements, IFI-Plenum, New York, USA, 1968.
Explore the element of your choice through this periodic table.
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*
71
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**
103
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*Lanthanoids *
57
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**Actinoids **
89
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102