Measuring Duty Cycle

You can use the counters on your measurement device to measure duty cycle. Duty Cycle measurements measure the active time of a signal. Use the following equation to calculate the duty cycle of a pulse:

Duty Cycle = High Time/Pulse Period

where Pulse Period is high time plus low time.

The duty cycle of a pulse is between 0 and 1 and is often expressed as a percentage. Refer to the following figure for examples of duty cycles. A pulse with a high time equal to the low time has a duty cycle of 0.5, or 50%. A duty cycle less than 50% indicates that the low time is greater than the high time, and a duty cycle greater than 50% indicates that the high time is greater than the low time.

Creating a Program

Measuring Pulses Programming Flowchart