The analysis of the formation of an ionic compound from its elements is commonly discussed in terms of a Born-Haber cycle, which breaks the overall process into a series of steps of known energy. The Born-Haber cycle for the formation of sodium chloride is shown in Figure 5. At the start of the cycle, the elements are considered to be in the form in which they exist at normal pressure and temperature. First, sodium metal is vaporized to a gas of sodium atoms. This step requires an input of energy known as the atomization energy of sodium metal. Next, the appropriate number of chlorine molecules (Cl₂) are broken apart to provide a gas of chlorine atoms. This step also requires a considerable input of energy that is called the dissociation energy of chlorine. The origin of these two contributions to the energy can be clarified by considering metallic and covalent bonding in more detail (specifically, the lowering of energy that occurs when metallic or covalent bonds form); here they can be treated as empirical quantities. At this stage, an electron is removed from each sodium atom and attached to each chlorine atom. The ionization requires a considerable input of energy, and a fraction of that investment is recovered from the electron affinity of the chlorine atoms. Overall, however, there is a considerable increase in energy as compared to the two starting materials.

At this stage, the ions are allowed to come together to form a crystalline array. This step releases a large quantity of energy called the lattice energy of the compound. Energy is released in the process of crystal formation because first a cation becomes surrounded by anions, then that cluster of anions becomes surrounded by cations, and so on. As a result of this packing, every cation has anions as neighbours, and every anion has cations around it, and there is a strong overall attractive interaction among the many ions of opposite charge in the crystal. For sodium chloride, the lattice energy is so great that more energy is released in this step than is required for all the preceding steps combined, and solid sodium chloride therefore has a lower energy than sodium metal and chlorine gas. It is for this reason that, when sodium reacts with chlorine, a large quantity of heat is released.

Factors favouring ionic bonding

A Born-Haber cycle gives an indication of the factors that favour ionic bonding. Overall, the lattice energy must be great enough to overcome the energy required for ion formation. It follows that only elements with reasonably low ionization energies can contribute, as cations, to ionic materials, for too large an ionization energy could not be recovered from the resulting lattice energy. In practice, this criterion means that only metallic elements are likely to form cations, and two elements are unlikely to form an ionic compound unless one of them is a metal. Moreover, the steep increase in ionization energy required to break into a closed shell precludes the loss of all but the valence electrons. Furthermore, no more than about three electrons per atom can be lost before the increase in ionization energy becomes prohibitive.

It can also be seen from the Born-Haber cycle that elements will contribute anions to an ionic compound only if their electron affinity is positive or, at least, not too strongly negative. Elements with positive electron affinities are likely to form anions (as long as a metal is present). A negative electron affinity can be tolerated provided it is not too great and the additional energy investment can be recovered from a greater lattice energy. That is the reason why ionic oxides are so common: although energy is required to push the second electron on an oxygen atom to make an O²⁻ ion, the resulting ion produces such a high lattice energy that the energy investment is overcome.

Ionic bonding is likely to occur if the lattice energy of the compound is large, for a large lattice energy can compensate for some strongly demanding energy requirements, most notably for cation formation, earlier in the cycle. High lattice energies are achieved if the ions that form the lattice are small and highly charged, for small ions can pack together closely and interact strongly with one another. The O²⁻ ion of oxides is small (oxygen lies well to the right in the periodic table) and is reasonably highly charged (it has two negative charges; three negative charges is about the limit for monatomic anions). As a result, ionic oxides are widely formed by metallic elements. Although it is conceivable that O³⁻ ions could be formed if enough energy were provided to overcome the repulsion from the many electrons present in O²⁻, the necessary energy would not be recovered from the lattice energy, for O³⁻ anions are so large that the lattice energy of any compound they would form would be small. Once again, the termination of electron gain at a noble gas configuration is not so much a sign of some magic stability of such a species but rather a consequence of the fact that after such a configuration has been attained there is insufficient opportunity for achieving a lower energy.

The actual pattern in which cations and anions pack together is the one that results in the greatest lattice energy (that is, the greatest lowering of energy of the ions relative to the gas of ions). For further details on crystal arrangements, see crystal.