Kirchhoff's Voltage Law for a series circuit states that the total voltage drop is equal to what?

• A. Sum
• B. Product
• C. Difference
• D. Quotient

Answer: (A)

Kirchhoff's Voltage Law in a series circuit says that the total voltage drop around the loop equals the sum of the voltage drops across each component. Since the same current flows through every element, each component uses part of the source voltage, and those parts add up to the total supplied voltage. In other words, the voltage you see across the entire loop is the sum of all the individual drops, which is why you use addition here.

The other operations don’t describe how voltages distribute in a loop. Multiplying voltages would ignore how each component shares the same current, while subtracting or dividing isn’t how the total around a closed path is built up.