44 Β· simulations
The Lab
Every simulation on Physics Quest in one place. Experiment freely: you can't break anything, and nothing needs cleaning up.
Forces and motion8
π¦Challenge
Push the boxPush a crate across ice, wood, carpet and sand, and land it on the flag. Friction decides where it stops.Open πͺΆ
The drop towerRace a bowling ball, a feather and a parachute with air or in a vacuum, on Earth, the Moon, Mars or Jupiter.Open π
Race trackThree runners, three speeds. Watch their distanceβtime graphs draw themselves and predict the winner.Open πChallenge
Motion graphsDrive a car and see position, velocity and acceleration graphs live. Challenge: match a mystery graph.Open π°οΈChallenge
Space puckNo friction, no air: fire short thruster bursts and dock with the station. Newton's first law, the hard way.Open π
Force, mass and accelerationPull a cart with a force you choose, load it with mass, add friction, and watch F = ma unfold with a live free-body diagram.Open π₯
Collision labCrash two carts together, bouncy or sticky. Momentum is always conserved; kinetic energy isn't.Open π―Challenge
Projectile cannonSet the angle and speed, switch air resistance on or off, and hit the target. Watch the velocity split into two parts.Open Energy and machines2
Gravity and orbits3
π
Swing and releaseWhirl a ball on a string, then cut the string. Which way does it fly? See the centripetal force that kept it turning.Open π3D
Newton's cannonFire a cannonball from a mountain on a 3D Earth. Faster and faster: it falls, it orbits, it escapes.Open πͺChallenge
Orbit labLaunch a planet around a star and watch Kepler's laws appear: ellipses, equal areas in equal times.Open Oscillations, waves and sound5
π
Sound labPlay real tones, change pitch and loudness, and watch air molecules squeeze and stretch in slow motion.Open γ°οΈ
Spring oscillatorA mass on a spring draws its own sine wave. Change mass, stiffness and damping, and time the period.Open π3D
Pendulum waveFifteen pendulums of carefully tuned lengths make snakes, braids and chaos, then line up again every 30 seconds.Open π
Wave machineShake a rope: transverse or longitudinal, travelling or standing. Find the harmonics of a guitar string.Open π§
Ripple tankTwo sources make bright and dark stripes of interference. Then move a source and hear the Doppler effect in pictures.Open Light and optics4
π¦
Shadow theatreMove a lamp and a puppet to grow and shrink a shadow. Add a second lamp to make a half shadow.Open π·
Camera obscuraA box with a tiny hole makes an upside-down picture of the world, just as Ibn al-Haytham described a thousand years ago.Open π
Laser and glassAim a laser into water, glass or diamond. Watch it bend, split into colours and get trapped by total internal reflection.Open π
Lens labSlide a candle along a lens and follow the rays: real or virtual, upside down or upright, bigger or smaller.Open Electricity and magnetism5
π§²
Compass mapHundreds of tiny compasses reveal the invisible field of a magnet. Add a second magnet to feel attraction and repulsion.Open π‘Challenge
Circuit builderWire batteries, bulbs and switches in series or in parallel and watch the charges flow. Can you light every bulb?Open π
Ohm's law benchTurn the voltage, change the resistance, plot current against voltage and read the slope.Open β‘
Electric field painterDrop positive and negative charges and see field lines, equipotentials and the force on a test charge.Open π
Faraday's coilPush a magnet through a coil and the meter kicks. Faster motion, more turns, bigger voltage: the principle of every generator.Open Matter and heat6
π§
Float or sinkDrop objects into water, oil, Dead Sea brine or mercury and watch weight battle buoyancy.Open π
Archimedes' crownWas the king's crown pure gold? Hang it on a balance against a gold bar and lower both into water to find out.Open π
Powers of tenZoom from a proton to the observable universe, one power of ten at a time.Open π«§
Solid, liquid, gasHeat up a box of particles and watch them jiggle, slide and fly: melting and boiling, molecule by molecule.Open π
Gas in a boxHeat a gas, squeeze it with a piston, count the hits on the walls: the gas laws come straight from bouncing molecules.Open π²
Entropy and the arrow of timeLift the wall between two gases and watch them mix. Then wait for them to unmix. You'll wait a very long time.Open Relativity and quantum8
β±οΈ
Light clockA photon bouncing between mirrors on a speeding rocket. Push towards light speed and watch time stretch.Open π³οΈ3D
Curved spacetimeMasses bend a 3D grid of spacetime and moons roll along the curves. Squeeze a star into a black hole.Open βοΈ
Photoelectric effectShine light on a metal. Brighter red light does nothing; dim violet light kicks out electrons. Light comes in packets.Open βοΈ
Double slitFire electrons one at a time. Dots land at random, yet stripes appear. Now peek at which slit they go through.Open π3D
Atoms and spectraKick hydrogen's electron up the energy ladder and catch the photons it emits. Then explore its orbitals in 3D.Open π₯
Glowing hotHeat an object from red-hot to white-hot and see Planck's curve, the puzzle that started quantum physics.Open π§
Principle of least actionDrag a thrown ball's path into any shape and watch the action change. Nature picks the path where it is smallest.Open π¦
Double pendulumRelease three double pendulums a hair's breadth apart and watch chaos tear them apart.Open Nuclei, particles and the cosmos3
β’οΈ
Half-lifeWatch a grid of unstable nuclei decay at random, then date a mammoth bone with carbon-14.Open π§©Challenge
The Standard ModelExplore the 17 particles everything is made of, then build protons and neutrons from quarks.Open π
The expanding universeStretch space and see every galaxy rush away from every other. Measure Hubble's constant and the age of the universe.Open