IEC 61000-4-2 Ed. 3.0 b:2025

IEC 61000-4-2: 2025 relates to the immunity requirements and test methods for electrical and electronic equipment subjected to static electricity discharges from operators directly and from personnel to adjacent objects. It additionally specifies ranges of test levels which relate to different environmental, and installation conditions and establishes test procedures.

The objective of this document is to establish a common and reproducible basis for evaluating the performance of electrical and electronic equipment when subjected to electrostatic discharges. In addition, it includes electrostatic discharges which can occur from personnel to objects near the equipment.

This document specifies:

• ideal waveform of the discharge current;
• range of test levels;
• test equipment;
• test setup;
• test procedure;
• calibration procedure;
• measurement uncertainty.

This document gives specifications for tests performed in laboratories and guidance to post-installation tests. This document is not intended to specify the tests to be applied to particular apparatus or systems. The main aim is to give a general basic reference to all concerned product committees. The product committees remain responsible for the appropriate choice of the tests and the severity level to be applied to their equipment.

This document excludes tests intended to evaluate the ESD sensitivity of devices during handling and packaging. It is not intended for use in characterizing the performance of ESD protection circuit IEC Guide 107.

This document forms Part 4-2 of IEC 61000. It has the status of a basic EMC publication in accordance with IEC Guide 107. This third edition cancels and replaces the second edition published in 2008. This edition constitutes a technical revision.

This edition includes the following significant technical changes with respect to the previous edition:

• a) added a calibration requirement for ESD generators with air discharge tip;
• b) added a normative annex for test setups for particular kind of equipment (see Annex I);
• c) added an informative annex for wearable devices (see Annex J);
• d) added an informative annex on how to select test points and give guidance on how to specify the number of pulses for direct contact discharges (see Annex E);
• e) moved Clause 9 into a new informative annex (see Annex K);
• f) improvement of the current calibration procedure;
• g) improvement of the measurement uncertainty considerations with examples of uncertainty budgets;
• h) because post-installation tests cannot be performed in a controlled environment, this test method has been moved into a new informative Annex G.