Rare earth magnets are among the strongest permanent magnets available and are an important part of many modern and future technologies.
They are made from alloys containing rare earth elements, particularly neodymium or samarium. Neodymium-iron-boron (NdFeB) magnets can produce powerful magnetic fields despite their small size, making them useful in electric-vehicle motors, wind-turbine generators, drones, robots, computer drives, speakers, medical equipment, and many other devices where size and weight matter.
Despite their name, many rare earth elements are not extremely rare in Earth’s crust; the difficulty is finding concentrated deposits and economically separating and refining the chemically similar elements.
As electric vehicles, robotics, renewable energy, and other advanced technologies expand, demand for high-performance magnets could increase substantially.
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