Shadowing Practice: Via-in-Pad Reliability: When Does Your PCB Need It? #pcbmanufacturing #pcbdesign - Learn English Speaking with Video

Hello everybody, I am Zachariah Peterson.

Welcome back to my channel.

Today I'm going to be answering a viewer question about vias in SMD pads in PCB design.

Should you do it?

Should you do it in bottom terminated components or in any other type of component?

We're going to take a look at that viewer question.

We'll jump into some examples in Altium Designer.

And I'm going to show you some data from the IPC High Density Packaging User Group

that illustrates what can go wrong if you use a Via InPad.

Let's go ahead and get started.

This viewer question comes from one of our design review videos entitled ESP32 Design Overkill.

You guys know how much I have a love -hate relationship with ESP32.

And this question comes from WoWOWEWAH2203.

Nice username.

in general will finish off the PCB by covering the via through holes.

In addition, packages are just getting harder and harder to completely fan out with smaller pitch.

Our team has no choice but to use more expensive blind and buried vias now due to the package on LPDDR5s.

There are a few different dimensions to this question.

So first of all, most PCB manufacturers will leave your vias untented tent the vias.

If your PCB manufacturer is taking your design that doesn't have tented vias and is just tenting them anyways, you need to find a new manufacturer.

Your manufacturer should produce the board based on the data that you give them, not the data that they want to put into the board.

The second point I would like to note regards the manufacturing capabilities for via in pad.

The manufacturing capabilities have not been a problem for quite a long time.

Now, manufacturers will recommend to people to not put the vias in pad vias in pad, I think because a lot of people will just put via in pad

and then they won't think about whether or not they need to have it plated and filled or capped.

So if you are going to use via in pad, you need to make sure that you use it correctly.

If you put vias under SMD pads, make sure that you specify a conductive or non -conductive fill and then specify whether you need it planed over and planarized.

Now, if you are using a high density no choice but to use via in pad.

And that means you are going to have to specify filling and capping and plating over.

What I want to do now is hop into Altium, we can take a look at some designs that need via in pad, we'll see how to use it correctly.

And then we'll take a look at some reliability data for via in pad.

So you can understand the risks of using via in pad in your designs.

Now the first design that I want to look at is our Ethernet switch project that we did for all the

and you can see in this Ethernet switch we have three BGA components.

We have the main Ethernet switch controller here on U1, we then have an expansion PHY over here on U3,

and then U5 is a DRAM chip.

So if we put this into 2D, we can zoom in and we can see what type of design we're working with here.

So this is a design that does not require via in -pad.

could use via in pad if we wanted and we could use blind

and buried vias if we wanted to

but in this design we're not required to the reason for

that is of course if we just take a look at the pitch on these pads

if i can get my snap to work correctly

if we just take a look at the pitch on these pads you'll see here

that the pitch is one millimeter and of course we're able to fit an 8 via.

Even if we go over to this a little bit denser BGA for this DRAM chip,

you'll see here that if I measure the spacing between the pads on the DRAM chip, this is 0 .8 millimeters and the pad and via

that we have for this fanout is an 8 mil drill with a 16 mil pad.

So again we're still able to use the dog bone pitch.

Now what about a design where we're going to need via in pad?

Well at some point the pitch on these BGAs become

so small that we have no choice

but to put a via directly in the pad and that's

because of course as we collapse the spacing between these pins you will see here

that there's not going to be any room for this via in between these pads.

And so an example is shown here in one They are using the NRF 52 in the VFQFN package.

It has a 0 .5 millimeter vertical and horizontal pitch between these pins.

And as you can see here, we have vias placed directly into the pad.

Now, of course, if I were to try to put a via in this region, even with a 12 or 14 mil pad size, it just is not going to fit.

You have no choice but to put it directly in the pad.

Now, this is just for the BGA.

could do via in pad elsewhere in the design if we really wanted to.

But in this particular design, you can see here that the rest of the components are not super high density.

They're not super small components.

We don't have a bunch of zero two zero ones or zero one zero zero five passives on here.

And so in that case, we don't have a requirement to put the vias in pad on the rest of the design.

You can see here that we have one component right here, just a capacitor where one of the vias is in the pad

that is acceptable because these vias in the fabrication notes for this design are going to be filled

and capped so because of

that it is still acceptable to put these vias in pad like you see here on this capacitor

and like you see here underneath this nrf52 package.

So now we've seen what kinds of designs might need via in pad,

and we even see that you can use via in pad in cases where you don't necessarily have a high density BGA.

But when you do have a high density BGA, there are, of course, reliability issues that can arise.

And this has been studied pretty extensively by the IPC high density packaging user group, as well as PCB vendors and independent researchers.

So let's take a look at some of that data right now.

that I'm showing in these slides has been presented in some other videos

and I'm gonna link to some of these other videos in the video description

but for now what I want to do is just kind

of run through some of these BGA via in pad defects

that can arise during PCB assembly as well as after deployment in the field

so first head and pillow is an assembly defect where you have incomplete wetting and side of the BGA,

basically leaving a contact here between two separated balls of solder.

And of course that can lead to an intermittent short.

Here voiding occurs where you have voids that form in the solder ball, and you can even see here

that we have some via -in pad where some of the solder does adhere to the copper pad on the PCB,

but the void allows a crack to form along the bottom side of this ball.

leads to an intermittent failure.

Here you can also have a failure of the via -in pad itself,

where the cap essentially gets absorbed into the ball while the ball is molten, and that creates a failure of the via -in pad.

And then you can also just have ball fracture, where essentially you have repeated thermal cycling,

the solder ball on the bottom side of the package gets fatigued, and then eventually a crack forms, and then you get a fracture.

via in pad when we have via in pad we want to make sure

that we prevent some of these defects

and one way to help prevent some of these defects is to ensure planarity of the pad arrangement in

that BGA footprint now planarity can get affected due to dimples in the via in pad plating over process

so when you have a via in pad you then fill it

and cap and plate it the plating can form a and that dimple can then create some non -planarity.

Now on a small case passive, like for example a 0603 capacitor or 0805,

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those kinds of passives, probably not a big deal.

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And on smaller BGAs with low pin count, also really not a big deal.

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that non -planarity can create a lot of distortion in the

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contact between all of the balls on the bottom side of the package and the pad in the PCB footprint.

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And that could potentially lead to some of the issues that we saw in the previous slide.

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So given all of these potential problems where you have a ball

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that could get fractured or you have non -planarity leading to open circuits or leading

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reliability of these different types of leadless packages where you can use via in -pad.

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Well, the IPC High Density Packaging User Group has done some studies on via in -pad in BGAs as well as QFNs.

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And so what I'm going to do now is show some reliability data for three different types of packages, a BGA 192 package, a ceramic BGA package,

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basically where the substrate of the BGA package is a ceramic material.

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and a QFN package on a six layer PCB.

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Now the microvia aspect ratio on all of these packages is less than one, which is going to be considered a highly reliable microvia.

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Now these samples were thermally cycled and then they looked at the failure rate in each of these different package types.

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So first let's look at the reliability data for the QFN package compared to the ceramic BGA package.

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So here what you're seeing in these plots,

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plots and we're comparing the lifetime of these microvias for cases where we have via -in -pad versus no via -in -pad.

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And what you're seeing here for the QFN is

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that the QFN package with via in pad has approximately a

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12 % shorter lifetime than the QFN package without via in pad.

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Now eventually these two curves overlap and they have the same lifetime after you do enough thermal cycles,

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which is exactly what you would expect after repeated thermal cycling.

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in pad has similar lifetime as the ceramic BGA package with the via in pad.

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So I think this is a little surprising because when we talk about reliability of via in pad,

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we might expect that the via in pad reliability doesn't really depend on the package type

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and the data just shows that that isn't true.

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Next, let's compare the BGA 192 package with the ceramic BGA package.

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So again, the ceramic BGA package without the Via N -Pad and with the Via N -Pad have similar lifetimes,

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but when we compare the BGA 192 package with the Via N -Pad versus BGA 192 without Via N -Pad,

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we see very clearly that longer lifetime in this BGA package with no via in pad.

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So again you can use via in pad if you like, but this is one of the risks that you run into.

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And using via in pad is going to give you different levels of reliability depending on the package that you're working with.

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So again QFN is going to show a slightly lower lifetime,

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but with a BGA 192 package which has an organic FR4 substrate,

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it is going to have a much lower lifetime than a ceramic BGA package.

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Some further data from the IPC High Density Packaging User Group shows a few important points.

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So number one, failures tend to most commonly arise near the corner balls in the BGA package.

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That actually makes perfect sense because if you have any level of non -planarity

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that could be thermally induced or it's influenced by the presence of dimples in the via and pad process, distance

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and that's exactly why you would expect these failures to be

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more common in the corner balls of the package rather than in the center balls of the package.

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Now let's look at the data in the table in the bottom half of this slide.

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Here in this table what they're looking at ultimately is the number of components

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that do not show voiding in the corner solder balls

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and what you can see in the ceramic BGA package is

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that after thermal cycling all of the components show voiding the corner solder balls.

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So basically all of those solder balls are going to be at risk of failure from further thermal cycling.

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Now what about the BGA 192 package with via in pad and no via in pad?

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Well here you can see a very large difference between the via in pad case versus the no via in pad case.

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Only one of the components does not show voiding compared to 24 of the components showing

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via -in pad component with the BGA 192 package shows many more failures.

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Now what about a smaller BGA, for example, an 84 pin BGA with via -in pad versus no via -in pad?

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Well, again, the via -in pad package shows more failures, but still fewer failures than the larger BGA.

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And again, this is what we would expect with voiding that arises in the corner balls of the package.

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If you have a physically you're going to be at more risk of voiding and failure at the via -in pad because,

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again, that deformation accrues over distance.

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So that's exactly what the data shows us here.

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Now, reliability is clearly related to two things.

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Number one is the size of the package, and then number two is the materials used to make up the package.

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That's why we see the difference between the BGA -192 component and the ceramic BGA component.

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I guess there's a third part, process, but really the package matters as well.

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To help ensure reliability of BGA packages,

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PCB assemblers have done a really great job of planning their processes to ensure that the number of reflow cycles is minimized.

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Also, newer materials are available that have a closer coefficient of thermal expansion match to the coefficient of thermal expansion for copper.

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So these newer materials are enabling much higher density packages and PCBs.

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Some of the material vendors for example, AGC.

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They produce a new resin coated copper that has a low CTE.

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And Paul Cook, one of the podcast guests, was actually at a recent SMTA event on UltraHDI talking about some of these materials.

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So I will probably have Paul back on the Altium OnTrack podcast to discuss this more.

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And I might even have a conversation with him on my channel.

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So make sure to subscribe to Altium Academy and this channel to stay tuned for that content.

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on this channel and on the Altium Academy channel.

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And of course, if you ask a great PCB design question, it's probably gonna end up in one of these videos.

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Make sure to hit that like button, hit the subscribe button, and I'll see you next time, everybody.

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Thank you.

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Learning English with Tech Talks: A Practical Guide

Tech videos like "Via-in-Pad Reliability" are great for practicing English—they mix technical terms with everyday speech, making them perfect for building fluency. The speaker, Zachariah Peterson, uses clear, conversational language to explain complex PCB design concepts, making it easy to follow along while improving your listening and speaking skills.

Top 5 Phrases for Daily Communication

"jump into some examples" – Use this to suggest starting a hands-on activity, e.g., "Let's jump into some practice exercises."
"take a look at that" – A casual way to direct attention, like "Take a look at that new café downtown."
"the reason for that is" – Clarify causes simply: "I missed the bus—the reason for that is I overslept."
"what about a design where" – Shift focus to a new scenario: "What about a day where we skip the gym and relax?"
"you need to make sure that" – Emphasize importance: "You need to make sure that you lock the door."

Step-by-Step Shadowing Guide for This Video

Shadowing technique helps improve pronunciation and intonation. Here's how to use it with this video:

Listen once: Focus on understanding the main idea. Note how the speaker pauses between technical terms.
Shadow speech in short chunks: Pause after 5-10 seconds, repeat the words aloud. Mimic the rhythm—Zachariah speaks slowly, so match his pace.
Focus on key terms: Words like "vias," "PCB," and "pitch" are essential. Practice saying them clearly, as they’re common in tech contexts (useful for IELTS speaking practice too!).
Record yourself: Compare your recording to the video. Check if you’re stressing the right syllables (e.g., "manuFACTurer" vs. "MANufacturer").
Repeat daily: Spend 10 minutes on this video. Over time, you’ll notice smoother speech and better comprehension of technical English.

Learning English with YouTube videos like this one combines practical skills with real-world context. Keep practicing, and you’ll master both the language and the tech talk!

Grammar in this video

The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:

Structure	In the video
Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now	have tented · have not been · we've seen
Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it	is shown · be filled · has been studied
Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing	one, which is · package which has

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.

Shadowing technique: read the full step-by-step guide →

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Step-by-Step Shadowing Guide for This Video

Grammar in this video

What is the Shadowing Technique?