What is the difference between SMT and SMD?

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Surface mount technology, or SMT for short, is a novel approach to component placement on printed circuit boards. The PCBA sector makes extensive use of this technology, and practically all businesses that offer PCB assembly services can also handle SMT assembly. Electronic manufacturers implemented through-hole assembly in the early 1970s to accomplish component mounting and soldering tasks. Essentially, soldering guns were used to permanently arrange component through-hole arrangements after the leads of the components were inserted into drilled holes on bare PCBs. But as technology advanced, individuals gradually discovered that SMT assembly could be a better option and that through-hole PCB assembly was not always the best option.

SMD, short for Surface Mount Device, is an electronic component that is soldered to a printed circuit board and is designed to be mounted directly on the PCB. Currently, we have a variety of installation methods for PCB components. According to different installation methods, PCB components can be divided into various types, including DIP components and SMD components, that is, plug-in components and patch components. Affected by the trend of miniaturization, more SMDs are being used in the production of PCBA nowadays.

The difference between SMT and SMD.

These two little acronyms get mixed up a lot in the electronics manufacturing service world. On paper, they only vary by a single letter, but in practice, there’s a lot more separating SMTs and SMDs. Chiefly, one is a process and the other is a device.

An SMD, or surface mounted device, is an electronic component that you would find on a board.

An SMT, or surface mount technology, is the method of placing components (like an SMD) on the board. In electronic manufacturing services, the SMT process often works with SMDs, perhaps adding to the confusion.

In the field of electronics production, SMD and SMT are complementary even if they represent different concepts. Given the evolution of PCBAs, pick-and-place machines emerged as a result of the limits of manual soldering, which contributed to the fall of DIP components. Traditional SMD component assembly was once accomplished by hand soldering, however with the invention of placement machines, this technique is no longer viable. These days, ease of use, economy, and efficiency are critical components of development, and the combination of SMT and SMD meets these needs exactly.