[kooryan]

I am part of my highschool’s science bowl team, and whenever a question where it gives you a series of compounds, and asks to determine which compounds are polar or non polar, the only way - as of now - for me to determine whether each compound is polar or non polar is to draw the lewis structure for each compound as fast as I can. I was wondering if there was any “shortcut,” or tips available that chemists use to determine if a compound is polar/non-polar at first glance (unless, of course, drawing a lewis structure is the only way to determine when only given pen and paper - besides using electronegativity).

An example question is “which of the following molecules are polar?”

1. BrF₅
2. PF₅
3. SF₅

[AWK]

SF5 does not exist. See:Wikipedia - Disulfur_decafluoride

[Fish200398]

the shortcut is to memorize it....

apart from what you said looking electron distribution aka moment dipole aka Lewis structure

its actually can be done fast drawing Lewis structure if you get used to it