Active and passive components

Active components refer to components that can activate and amplify electrical signals, oscillate, control current or energy distribution, and even perform data operations and processing when receiving energy supply. Active components include a variety of transistors, integrated circuits, image tubes, and displays.

Passive components, compared to active components, are unable to excite, amplify, oscillate, and respond passively to electrical signals, which pass through electronic components according to their original basic characteristics. The most common resistors, capacitors, inductors, and so on are passive components.