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Tungsten

Tungsten (W) is a transition metal with atomic number 74 and an atomic mass of 183.84. Its electron configuration is [Xe] 4f14 5d4 6s2.

Tungsten key data

Symbol W
Atomic number 74
Atomic mass (standard atomic weight) 183.84
Molar mass 183.84 g/mol
Protons 74
Neutrons (most abundant isotope, tungsten-184) 110
Electrons (neutral atom) 74
Category Transition metal
Period 6
Group 6
Block d-block
Noble gas notation [Xe] 4f14 5d4 6s2
Full electron configuration 1s2 2s2 2p6 3s2 3p6 3d10 4s2 4p6 4d10 4f14 5s2 5p6 5d4 6s2
Electrons per shell 2, 8, 18, 32, 12, 2

Atomic mass: IUPAC CIAAW abridged standard atomic weights, 2024. Most abundant isotope: NIST Atomic Weights and Isotopic Compositions.

The values are facts and free to use; this page’s selection and presentation are © 2026 ScienceQuest.

Measured properties of tungsten

From PubChem, the US National Institutes of Health. Public domain. The first ionisation energy is the value for tungsten from the NIST Atomic Spectra Database, in place of PubChem’s 7.98 eV.

Melting point 3695 K (3421.9 °C), 2nd of 103 by melting point
Boiling point 5828 K (5554.9 °C), 2nd of 93 by boiling point
Density 19.3 g/cm³, 7th of 96 by density
State at room temperature Solid
Electronegativity 2.36 (Pauling), 13th of 95 by electronegativity
Van der Waals radius 210 pm, joint 46th of 99 by atomic radius
First ionisation energy 7.864 eV (758.8 kJ/mol), 37th of 102 by first ionisation energy
Electron affinity 0.815 eV (78.6 kJ/mol), 27th of 57 by electron affinity
Common oxidation states +6
Discovered 1783

Each rank counts down from the highest value, among the elements PubChem’s table gives one for, and links to that property ranked across the whole table. All of them are collected under periodic trends.

Tungsten electron configuration

The full electron configuration of tungsten is 1s2 2s2 2p6 3s2 3p6 3d10 4s2 4p6 4d10 4f14 5s2 5p6 5d4 6s2. With the noble-gas core collapsed it is [Xe] 4f14 5d4 6s2, and the outermost subshell is 6s2.

Bohr model of tungsten (W): a nucleus and six shells holding 2, 8, 18, 32, 12 and 2 electrons from the inside out.
Bohr model of tungsten (W). Image © ScienceQuest, CC BY 4.0: free to reuse with credit to ScienceQuest and a link to this page, as the image licence explains.
Orbital box diagram of tungsten (W), [Xe] 4f14 5d4 6s2, with the xenon core drawn as one bar: one box per orbital, filled by Hund’s rule, showing four unpaired electrons, in 5d.
Orbital diagram of tungsten (W). Image © ScienceQuest, CC BY 4.0: free to reuse with credit to ScienceQuest and a link to this page, as the image licence explains.

Why group and block follow from this is set out in how the periodic table maps electron configuration, and the electron configuration of every element is listed on one page.

Mass of one tungsten atom

A molar mass is grams per mole, so dividing by the Avogadro constant gives the mass of a single atom, or for an element with more than one natural isotope the average mass of its atoms, and the reciprocal gives how many atoms sit in a gram.

Mass of one atom

  1. one atom = 183.84 / (6.02214076 × 10²³)
  2. = 3.0527 × 10⁻²² g

Atoms in one gram

  1. atoms per gram = 6.02214076 × 10²³ / 183.84
  2. = 3.2758 × 10²¹ atoms

Tungsten on the periodic table

Tungsten is in period 6, group 6, in the d-block.

The other elements of group 6 are chromium, molybdenum and seaborgium.

The rest of period 6

Work with tungsten