Image: Wikimedia Commons

transparency

Property of an object or substance to transmit light with minimal scattering

Also known as pellucidity · diaphaneity · transparent

Instance of: optical property
1
Sources
1.Stated in Art & Architecture Thesaurus
View statement on Wikidata ↗
Subclass of: transmission

Overview

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia · Read full article · Text CC BY-SA 4.0

In the field of optics, transparency is the physical property of allowing light to pass through the material without appreciable scattering of light. On a macroscopic scale, the photons can be said to follow Snell's law. Translucency is the physical property of allowing light to pass through the material. It allows light to pass through but the light does not necessarily follow Snell's law on the macroscopic scale; the photons may be scattered at either of the two interfaces, or internally, where there is a change in the index of refraction. In other words, a translucent material is made up of components with different indices of refraction, while a transparent material is made up of components with a uniform index of refraction. Transparent materials appear clear, with the overall appearance of one color, or any combination leading up to a brilliant spectrum of every color. The opposite property of translucency is opacity. Other categories of visual appearance, related to the perception of regular or diffuse reflection and transmission of light, have been organized under the concept of cesia in an order system with three variables, including transparency, translucency and opacity among the involved aspects.

Overview

All data

37 statements · 22% with external sources · numbers in brackets are citations

Different from: translucency
Does not have characteristic: scattering

On other databases

32 identifiers linking transparency across the web's reference databases

Data quality

statements

22%

externally sourced

Source last edited October 4, 2026. AIDB refreshes this page daily.

Suggest a fact or correction

Links

Use this data

curl https://aidb.si/api/v1/entities/Q487623

API docs, limits & keys

Cite this page

AIDB. (2026). transparency (Q487623). Retrieved from https://aidb.si/e/transparency-Q487623