Now following acids, we're going to say that strong bases are strong electrolytes and weak bases are weak electrolytes. Now with strong bases, we're going to say because they're strong electrolytes did associate or ionize completely in water and our strong proton acceptors remember when we say the term proton, we just mean H⁺, so they readily accept an H₂O.

Now bases on the other hand, because they're weak, they only partially dissociate. They don't completely ionize into ions and they are weak proton acceptors and they favor reactants. If we take a look here, we have sodium hydroxide which is a good example of a strong base, and then as a weak base we have ammonia.

Here sodium hydroxide completely ionizes when we throw it into water. So it breaks up to form 100% of sodium ion and hydroxide ion it associates completely. We're going to say here that it is a strong proton acceptor. This, OH^- that's created could gain an H from the water surrounding it. We'll talk about that in greater detail later on. And then here since we make 100% of our products, that means we'll have no reactants left. So this reaction heavily favors the formation of products.

Now for a weak base, ammonia is a weak base, it's a positive amine. Here because it's a weak base, very little of these ions are formed. So we're going to have a small arrow pointing towards the product side. A vast majority of it will exist in its molecular form in NH₃. So we show a larger arrow pointing in the opposite direction. So here it only partially dissociates. So we make way less than 100% of these ions. It is a weak proton acceptor and we're heading towards the reactant side to the reactants are more favored than the products.

So keep this in mind when we're looking at the differences, at least in terms of dissociation of strong bases versus weak bases.