How to Draw the Lewis Dot Structure for ClI3: Chlorine Triiodide

A step-by-step explanation of how to draw the ClI3 Lewis Dot Structure.

For the ClI3 structure use the periodic table to find the total number of valence electrons for the ClI3 molecule. Once we know how many valence electrons there are in ClI3 we can distribute them around the central atom with the goal of filling the outer shells of each atom.

In the Lewis structure of ClI3 structure there are a total of 28 valence electrons. ClI3 is also called Chlorine Triiodide .

Note that ClI3 can have an Expanded Octet and have more than eight valence electrons. Because of this there may be several possible Lewis Structures. To arrive at the most favorable Lewis Structure we need to consider formal charges. See my video for help with formal charges: youtube.com/watch?v=vOFAPlq4y_k

For a complete tutorial on drawing Lewis Structures, see my video: youtu.be/1ZlnzyHahvo
For more practice, see youtu.be/DQclmBeIKTc
To learn to find the valence electrons: youtu.be/VBp7mKdcrDk
Get more chemistry help at thegeoexchange.org/chemistry/bonding

Drawing/writing done in InkScape. Screen capture done with Camtasia Studio 4.0. Done on a Dell Dimension laptop computer with a Wacom digital tablet (Bamboo).