How do capacitors behave when connected in series?

When capacitors are connected in series, the total capacitance is determined by the reciprocal of the sum of the reciprocals of the individual capacitances. This is expressed in the formula:

1/C_total = 1/C_1 + 1/C_2 + ...

This means that to find the total capacitance for capacitors in series, you must take each capacitor's capacitance, take the reciprocal of each, add these values together, and then take the reciprocal of that sum to find the overall capacitance.

This behavior arises because in a series connection, the charge stored on each capacitor is the same, while the voltage across each capacitor can vary. Since capacitance is defined as the charge stored per unit voltage, the effective capacitance decreases when capacitors are connected in series compared to when they are connected in parallel. Thus, the more capacitors you add in series, the lower the total capacitance becomes, which aligns with the formula that governs this behavior.