Crest Factor

The relative phases of the constituent tones with respect to each other determine the crest factor of a multitone signal with specified amplitude. The crest factor is the ratio of the peak magnitude to the RMS value of the signal.

As an example, a sine wave has a crest factor of 1.414:1. The following equation defines the crest factor:

F c = V p k V r m s

where

Fc is the crest factor

Vpk is the peak value of the signal

Vrms is the RMS value of the signal.