Octet Rule

The word “octet” may be a bit misleading because for some atoms, an octet is “2” and for other, an octet is “18”.

The Octet Rule is the idea that an atom is willing to gain or lose electrons in order to gain the stability of having a “full octet” of electrons in its Valence Shell.

By itself, the Octet Rule is not enough. We can draw structures that have the octet filled but they are not the most stable structures because they do not have a zero Formal Charge.