Electronic – the lowest capacitor voltage rating that is safe to use

capacitorreliabilityvoltage

I'm using a few Case R tantalum capacitors (10uF 6.3V) as bulk decoupling on the 3.3V power of a 100mbps Ethernet phy. I am also using 0.1uF ceramics closer to the pins.

Ethernet phy PCB

As usual, I'm terribly pushed for space on the PCB, and so I would like to replace them with 0603 size caps. The problem is that they're only rated for 4V. Normally I would always rate my capacitors for twice the voltage that they're ever going to see.

Is it likely to be a problem if I use a 4V capacitor on a regulated 3.3V line?

Best Answer

Using tantalum caps for decoupling is silly with today's options. 1 µF 6 V ceramic caps in 0603 package are cheap and readily available. That would be better than 10 µF for decoupling anyway. A 10 µF at the power supply connection points makes sense, but not for decoupling. Take a look at the impedance plots of 100 nF, 1 µF, and 10 µF ceramic caps in the datasheets of any of the reputable manufacturers.