Voltage regulation

In electrical engineering, particularly power engineering, voltage regulation is the ability of a system to provide near constant voltage over a wide range of load conditions. It is a dimensionless quantity defined as:

where V_nl is voltage at no load and V_fl is voltage at full load. A smaller value of VR is usually beneficial.

Sometimes, the term voltage regulation is used to describe processes by which the quantity VR is reduced, especially concerning special circuits and devices for this purpose, voltage regulators. Voltage regulators are an important part of power systems and power supplies.