When a household fixture goes pop, a battery starts acting up, or your car’s electrical components don’t seem to be working right, a multimeter can come to the rescue. These super-versatile tools measure a wide range of electrical properties, including voltage, resistance and continuity. They’re essential for tinkerers, shade-tree mechanics, and anyone else who needs to troubleshoot electrical issues. Whether you’re just starting out with basic DIY projects or are an expert tradie, we’ll help you find the right digital multimeter for your electronics work.

What to look for in a versatile multimeter for electronics

First up, consider what type of electrical tasks you need your new tool to tackle. Most versatile multimeters for electronics can measure alternating and direct current, but you might also want a model that’s able to check resistance (measured in ohms) or capacitance, for example. Resistance testing can be especially helpful in finding faulty wires or other components, as it indicates the amount of opposition to current flow — water, your body and a strand of copper wire all resist to some extent.

Other useful functions include measuring voltage (measured in volts) and frequency, which can help you figure out if an AC circuit has too many or too few cycles per second and whether or not a component is functioning properly. Many models can also test continuity, detecting when the probes are connected to both ends of a circuit that’s not broken and emitting an audible tone. For maximum accuracy, look for a model that measures true RMS (root mean square) rather than a standard average. This function allows the multimeter to calculate precise measurements of fluctuating values, whereas standard meters can only do a rough estimate. Look for a model with a high resolution (count) as well — think of this like the ruler you used in school, where the number of markings on the edge tells you how precise the measurement is.