🧪 Concentration Thickening Calculator
Calculate the final concentration when thickening a solution.
Original Solution
Thickening Target
What is Thickening?
Thickening means evaporating water (solvent) to raise the concentration. The amount of solute (salt) does not change.
Thickening Formula
Salt = Original Solution × Original Concentration / 100
Final Solution Amount = Salt / Target Concentration × 100
Water to Evaporate = Original Solution − Final Solution
Worked examples
500 g of a 10% solution contains 50 g of solute; evaporating 250 g of water leaves 250 g at 20%.
To turn 1 kg of 5% into 10%, evaporate 500 g of water: 50 g of solute in the remaining 500 g is exactly 10%.
What the evaporation assumes
Only water leaves, so the solute mass is unchanged and the final mass is the starting mass minus the evaporated water. Anything volatile besides water — alcohol, ammonia, some acids — invalidates the result. At very high concentrations the solution can reach saturation and crystallise rather than thicken further.
Frequently asked questions
- How much water must evaporate to double the strength?
- Half of the solution mass. 500 g of 10% becomes 250 g of 20% after 250 g of water evaporates.
- Can any concentration be reached this way?
- Only up to the solubility limit of the solute at that temperature; beyond it the excess crystallises instead of dissolving.
- Is there a quicker way to compute it?
- Final mass = solute mass ÷ target fraction. With 50 g of solute and a 20% target that is 250 g, and the evaporated water is the difference from the original mass.