IB HL Physics

Here are the notes, separated by topic:

  1. Physics and Measurement
  2. Mechanics
  3. Gravitation
  4. Waves
  5. Electricity and Magnetism
  6. Energy, power and climate change
  7. Thermal Physics
  8. Nuclear Physics
  9. Quantum Physics
  10. Digital Technology

Or, alternatively, a zip file containing the whole lot.

About the notes

While these notes were for the exams in 2015, I think they might still be applicable for the syllabus starting in 2016. This is because, while I did have the syllabus beside me when I was making the notes, in the end I decided not to follow the same format as the syllabus. Instead, I grouped similar sections and put them in a logical order.

The notes are more-or-less complete, but that being said in some cases I may have neglected obvious points. Make sure you check your syllabus to ensure that you are covered. In some cases, I have included derivations (or maths) beyond the syllabus, e.g. I mention differential equations a few times (which sadly aren’t on our HL maths syllabus either). I did this because I find the maths much more intuitive and it helps me to understand better. Some people prefer a purely conceptual understanding, and that’s fine for IB.

The notes are not in the same order as the syllabus, because the syllabus order doesn’t flow well (because they have to make it usable for the SL people as well). The order of the topics I’ve done can be seen in the ‘cover page and contents’ pdf, but I’ll put it here too.

Some other points