What is the 5V6 vacuum tube?

The 5V6 is a tetrode vacuum tube designed for power applications. 5V heater 6V6..

What is a 5V6 substitute or equivalent?

Direct equivalents to the 5V6 include 6V6. These share the same pinout and operating envelope, so they can usually be swapped without circuit changes — though batch-to-batch variations between manufacturers (NOS vs current production) may shift the sonic character noticeably.

What are the key specifications of the 5V6?

Amplification factor μ ≈ 10, transconductance gm ≈ 4.1 mA/V, plate resistance rp ≈ 50.0 kΩ, max plate voltage 315 V, max plate dissipation 12 W, heater 4.7 V / 0.6 A.

Is the 5V6 still in production?

Production status varies by year and manufacturer. The current Amperatubes catalog classifies the 5V6 as Moderate availability. NOS (new-old-stock) examples from RCA, Mullard, Tung-Sol, GE, Sylvania and Telefunken trade among collectors; modern production where it exists comes mostly from JJ Electronic, Electro-Harmonix, Tung-Sol (New Sensor), Genalex, and a handful of small-batch makers.

What does the 5V6 sound like?

5V heater 6V6.. Sonic character also depends heavily on the circuit operating point, the surrounding tubes in the stage, and the output transformer when present — use the interactive loadline calculator on this page to explore the trade-offs.

By Jean-Michel Falligan Devergne · Reviewed May 29, 2026

←5V6

← 5U4G 5Y3GT →Compare → 6V6

5V6 Tetrode Vacuum Tube

Tetrode4.7V / 0.6AOctalSPICE

Sourcedatasheet4u 5V6 / 6V6 familyReviewed2026-05-29StatusDataModelCalcModelKoren pentodePDF

Beam power tetrode rated at 12W for high-power output stages

Datasheet ↗SPICE

5V6 — RCA — tetrode vacuum tube — (1950)

50.0kΩ

4.1mA/V

9.0pF

0.7pF

7.50pF

GAIN10%

POWER30%

DRIVE50%

LINEARITY95%

SPECIFICATIONS

Heater4.7 V · 0.6 A

Max Plate Voltage315 V

Pa max12 W

Gain Factor10

gm4.1 mA/V

rp50.0 kΩ

Inter-electrode capacitances

Cgk9 pF

Cgp0.7 pF

Cpk7.5 pF

PinoutOctal

Era1950

RarityModerate

HEATER4.7V / 0.6A

MAX PLATE315V / 12W

BASEoctal

Source datasheets

2 manufacturer datasheets cross-checked for 5V6

2 verified

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The 5V6 is a indirectly-heated beam tetrode from RCA, introduced around 1950. It provides a gain factor (μ) of 10 with 50.0kΩ plate resistance. Commonly used in power applications. 5V heater 6V6.

VS 6V6

Rp -4%Pd 0%Full comparison →

HISTORY

Introduced1950ManufacturerRCA

Golden Age