Why do sodium and chloride ions attract each other?
like attracts like
sulfides attract
magnetism
opposites attract
Sodium and chloride ions have equal but opposite charges. Opposites attract, so sodium and chloride ions attract each other. They cling together in a strong ionic bond. You can see this in row 2 of Figure above . Brackets separate the ions in the diagram to show that the ions in the compound do not share electrons. You can see animations of sodium chloride forming at these URLs:.