Current In A Short Circuit __full__ May 2026

A 12V car battery with a short-circuit path of only 0.01Ω. [ I = \frac{12}{0.01} = 1200 \text{ amperes} ]

[ I = \frac{V}{R} ]

In a short circuit, that load is bypassed entirely. The current takes a "shortcut" directly from the positive terminal to the negative terminal (or from hot to neutral/ground) through a path of nearly zero resistance. To understand why the current skyrockets, we turn to Ohm’s Law: current in a short circuit