An antistatic bag is a packaging material that is specially designed to help prevent static electricity interacting with sensitive electrical components. These bags are made of plastic polyethylene terephthalate and often used to store and transfer electrostatic sensitive equipment. They come in many different sizes, from small bags for RAM chips to big bags for motherboards. Many antistatic bags have a silver color and are semi-reflective, while others are mostly clear and black, blue, or pink. If you have ever purchased a computer hardware device, such as a hard drive, sound card, or video card, it likely came inside an antistatic bag.

The pictures are examples of how an antistatic bag may look. The top picture shows a mostly clear antistatic bag with a network card inside. The bottom picture shows a dark gray antistatic bag for a stick of RAM.

Antistatic, Electronics terms

Remember that only the inside of an antistatic bag is protected. Placing a hardware device on top of the bag and not inside of the bag will not protect it. In fact, it is often more dangerous to place an electrostatic-sensitive device on top of the bag.

If you are planning on replacing or doing any computer repair, having one or more antistatic bags as part of your tools helps make sure any removed devices stay safe.

  • How to install computer hardware.
  • ESD or electrostatic discharge help and information.