# How to find refractive index of a material? [ 4 ways]

In another article, we already have discussed the refractive index of a material and most of the facts related to refractive index. The value of the index of refraction is different for different materials. So, we need a process to know or calculate the refractive index of different materials. In this article, we are going to discuss how to find refractive index of a material.

1. How to calculate the refractive index?
2. How to find index of refraction using Snell’s law?
3. What is the formula to calculate refractive index of a medium?
4. How to find refractive index of diamond?

## How to find refractive index of a material?

There are four different ways to find the refractive index of a material. These are –

• By using the formula of refractive index.
• By using the Snell’s law of refraction of light.
• Using the spectrometer.
• With the help of refractive index calculator

## What is the formula to calculate refractive index of a medium?

One can determine the refractive index by using the standard formula. Equation-(1) is the formula to calculate the refractive index of a medium.

${\color{Blue} \mu = \frac{c}{v}}$………..(1)

If the speed of light in that medium is known, then one can easily calculate the refractive index of that medium by using this formula.

## How to find index of refraction using Snell’s law?

The Snell’s law of refraction of light is another way to find the refractive index of a medium. In fact, it is very common method to find index of refraction using Snell’s law. If ${\color{Blue}\theta_{1}}$ and ${\color{Blue}\theta_{2}}$ be the angle of incident and angle of refraction respectively, then according to the Snell’s law, the refractive index of second medium with respect to the first medium is,

${\color{Blue} \mu = \frac{Sin\theta_{1}}{Sin\theta_{2}}}$………(2)

There is an experiment on finding of index of refraction by using Snell’s law of refraction.

## How to find the refractive index of Prism?

One can find the index of refraction of a glass prism by using optical spectrometer. This is one of the popular experiments of optics in higher level physics.

Apart from these, the refractive index of a medium can be calculated by using the refractive index calculators. A refractive index calculator is usually programmed with one of the above two equations of refractive index. You just need to put the relevant data to get the value of refractive index.

So, these are the four ways to determine the refractive index of a medium. If you have any doubt on this topic, you can ask me in the comment section.

Thank you!

Related posts:

1. Refractive index: Definition, dependence and list for different materials.