What is the molecular geometry of h2o? 

The molecular geometry of a molecule is the overall shape of its molecules. This is influenced by its Lewis structure, the arrangement of its atoms, and its electrons. 

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There are many factors that influence a molecule’s shape, but one of the most important is the electron density within each molecule. The number of electron pairs around an atom defines its electron group geometry. 

In the case of a molecule with four electron pairs (like the molecules CH4, NH3, and H2O), each molecule has a tetrahedral electron group geometry as per VSEPR theory. 

However, a molecule that has more than four electron pairs can have different shapes depending on the total number of bonding and nonbonding pairs of electrons. 

For instance, the oxygen molecule has a different geometry from hydrogen because it has less valence electrons than hydrogen, so it can’t have as many bonding pairs. The lone pairs of electrons on the central oxygen atom push the hydrogen atoms around, making it have a bent shape as opposed to a planar structure. 

The oxygen atom also has a higher repulsion force with the hydrogen atoms than the hydrogen atoms have with each other, so it can’t form a bond with the hydrogen atoms as easily. 

Because of the repulsion forces between the two oxygen atoms, water has a distorted tetrahedral geometry, and some people refer to this bond geometry as angular or v-shaped. 

This is because the repulsion between the lone pairs on the oxygen atom and the bonded pairs of hydrogen atoms is higher than the repulsion between the bonded pairs of hydrogen atoms and the lone pair electrons. 

These repulsions are responsible for the distorted tetrahedral electron geometry, and they account for the bending of the geometry of each individual water molecule. This distorted tetrahedral geometric structure is called a distorted tetrahedron or seesaw, and some scientists use the term distorted tetrahedral or distorted v-shaped geometry to describe the tetrahedral geometric structure of water. 

Interestingly, the lone pair electrons on the oxygen atom can also have different repulsions with each other than the bonded pairs of hydrogen atoms. This is because the lone pair electrons are in an axial position, while the bonded pairs of hydrogen atoms are in an equatorial position. 

The resulting difference in repulsion between the lone pairs of electrons on the oxygen atom and the bonded hydrogen atoms can explain why water has a bent geometry instead of a planar shape as well as why ammonia is not a planar molecule. 

Another explanation of the repulsions between the lone pairs on the oxygen and the bonded pairs of hydrogen atoms can be found in the lone pair-bond pair repulsions theory. This theory says that the repulsion between the lone pair electrons on the oxide atom and the bonded hydrogen atoms is more than the repulsion between the lone electrons of the oxygen and the bonding pairs of hydrogen atoms, which in turn causes the lone pair electrons to push the bonded pairs of hydrogen atoms, thus distorting their tetrahedral geometric structure.