5 Band resistors and correct orientation

There are only two possible ways to read the resistor's color rings right to left or left to right. One of the two outer rings is the tolerance ring, the other rings indicate value. As others have stated, there is often a subtle difference in (location of) the tolerance ring, but not always too clear. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_color_code#Resistor_color-coding For cheap and easy to find resistors, the tolerance ring is often gold (5%, 4 band, E12) or red (2%, 5 band, E96)

If you have no clue about value nor tolerance you can decode both possibilities and then check them against the E96 preferred numbers. The one that matches E96 is the correct value. http://logwell.com/tech/components/resistor_values.html

Of course you may want to verify the found value with your multimeter.


In general the tolerance band is separated from the rest of the bands by a very slightly larger gap. It can be hard to tell sometimes.


Normally the band that's over the end cap is the right-hand one, but that top row looks pretty ambiguous. The bottom ones are 220 ohms 1%, the top ones look like 220K 1%.

Measure them with an ohmmeter then check with what it should be- there's only two combinations, and not many values have brown as the left band (the most common -1%- tolerance band for 5-band through-hole resistors).

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Resistors