'Chebyshev filters' are
analog or
digital filters having a steeper
roll-off and more
passband ripple than
Butterworth filters. Chebyshev filters have the property that they minimize the error between the idealized filter characteristic and the actual over the range of the filter, but with ripples in the passband.
This type of filter is named in honor of
Pafnuty Chebyshev because their mathematical characteristics are derived from
Chebyshev polynomials.
Because of the passband ripple inherent in Chebyshev filters, filters which have a smoother response in the passband but a more irregular response in the stopband are preferred for some applications.
Type I Chebyshev Filters

The frequency response of a fourth-order type I Chebyshev low-pass filter with
These are the most common Chebyshev filters. The gain (or
amplitude) response as a function of angular frequency
of the ''n''th order low pass filter is
:
where
is the ripple factor,
is the
cutoff frequency and
is a
Chebyshev polynomial of the
th order.
The passband exhibits equiripple behavior, with the ripple determined by the ripple factor
. In the passband, the Chebyshev polynomial alternates between 0 and 1 so the filter gain will alternate between maxima at ''G=1'' and minima at
. At the cutoff frequency
the gain again has the value
but continues to drop into the stop band as the frequency increases. This behavior is shown in the diagram on the right. (''note'': the common definition of the cutoff frequency to −3
dB does ''not'' hold for Chebyshev filters!)
The order of a Chebyshev filter is equal to the number of
reactive components (for example,
inductors) needed to realize the filter using
analog electronics.
The ripple is often given in
dB:
:Ripple in dB =
so that a ripple of 3 dB results from
.
An even steeper roll-off can be obtained if we allow for ripple in the stop band, by allowing zeroes on the
-axis in the complex plane. This will however result in less suppression in the stop band. The result is called an
elliptic filter, also known as Cauer filters.
Poles and zeroes
For simplicity, assume that the cutoff frequency is equal to unity. The poles
of the gain of the Chebyshev filter will be the zeroes of the denominator of the gain. Using the complex frequency ''s'':
:
Defining
and using the trigonometric definition of the Chebyshev polynomials yields:
:
solving for
:
where the multiple values of the arc cosine function are made explicit using the integer index ''m''. The poles of the Chebyshev gain function are then:
:
::::
Using the properties of the trigonometric and hyperbolic functions, this may be written in explicitly complex form:
:
::::
where ''m=1,2,...n'' and
:
This may be viewed as an equation parametric in
and it demonstrates that the poles lie on an ellipse in ''s''-space centered at s=0 with a real semi-axis of length
and an imaginary semi-axis of length of
The transfer function
The above expression yields the poles of the gain ''G''. For each complex pole, there is another which is the complex conjugate, and for each conjugate pair there are two more that are the negatives of the pair. The
transfer function must be stable, so that its poles will be those of the gain that have negative real parts and therefore lie in the left half plane of complex frequency space. The transfer function is then given by
:
where
are only those poles with a negative sign in front of the real term in the above equation for the poles.
In order to obtain a gain of 1 for
=0 (as shown in the next figure) the transfer function H(s) has to be normalized with a contstant.
The group delay

Gain and group delay of a fifth order type I Chebyshev filter with ε=0.5.
The
group delay is defined as the derivative of the phase with respect to angular frequency and is a measure of the distortion in the signal introduced by phase differences for different frequencies.
:
The gain and the group delay for a fifth order type I Chebyshev filter with ε=0.5 are plotted in the graph on the left. It can be seen that there are ripples in the gain and the group delay in the passband but not in the stop band.
Type II Chebyshev Filters

The frequency response of a fifth-order type II Chebyshev low-pass filter with
Also known as inverse Chebyshev, this type is less common because it does not roll off as fast as type I, and requires more components. It has no ripple in the passband, but does have equiripple in the stopband. The gain is:
:
In the stop band, the Chebyshev polynomial will oscillate between 0 and 1 so that the gain will oscillate between zero and
:
and the smallest frequency at which this maximum is attained will be the cutoff frequency
. The parameter ε is thus related to the
stopband attenuation γ in
decibels by:
:
For a stopband attenuation of 5dB, ε = 0.6801; for an attenuation of 10dB, ε = 0.3333. The frequency ''f
C = ω
C/2 π'' is the cutoff frequency. The 3dB frequency f
H is related to f
C by:
:
Poles and zeroes
Again, assuming that the cutoff frequency is equal to unity, the poles
of the gain of the Chebyshev filter will be the zeroes of the denominator of the gain:
:
The poles of gain of the type II Chebyshev filter will be the inverse of the poles of the type I filter:
:
:
where ''m=1,2,...,n'' . The zeroes
of the type II Chebyshev filter will be the zeroes of the numerator of the gain:
:
The zeroes of the type II Chebyshev filter will thus be the inverse of the zeroes of the Chebyshev polynomial.
:
where ''m=1,2,...,n'' .
The transfer function
The transfer function will be given by the poles in the left half plane of the gain function, and will have the same zeroes but these zeroes will be single rather than double zeroes.
The group delay

Gain and group delay of a fifth order type II Chebyshev filter with ε=0.1.
The gain and the group delay for a fifth order type II Chebyshev filter with ε=0.1 are plotted in the graph on the left. It can be seen that there are ripples in the gain in the stop band but not in the pass band.
Implementation
Cauer topology
A passive LC Chebyshev
low-pass filter may be realized using a
Cauer topology.Inductor or capacitor values of a nth-order Chebyshev filter may be calculated from the following equations:
:
:
, k =2,3,4,...n,
:G
1, G
k are the capacitor or inductor element values.
:f
H, the 3 dB frequency is calculated with:
:The coefficients A, Y, β, A
k, and B
k may be calculated from the following equations:
::
::
::
, k = 1,2,3,...n
::
, k = 1,2,3,...n
::where R
dB is the passband ripple in decibels.

Butterworth filter using Cauer topology
The calculated G
k values may then be converted into
shunt capacitors and top inductors as shown on the right, or they may be converted into top capacitors and shunt inductors.
★ For example, C
1 shunt=G
1, L
2 top=G
2, ...
★ or L
1 shunt = G
1, C
1 top=G
2, ...
The resulting circuit is a normalized low-pass filter. Using
frequency transformations and
impedance scaling, the normalized low-pass filter may be transformed into
high-pass,
band-pass, and
band-stop filters of any desired
cutoff frequency or
bandwidth.
Digital
As with most analog filters, the Chebyshev may be converted to a digital (discrete-time)
recursive form via the
bilinear transform. However, as
digital filters have a finite
bandwidth, the response shape of the transformed Chebyshev will be
warped. Alternatively, the Matched Z-transform may be used, which does not warp the response.
Comparison with other linear filters
Here is an image showing the Chebyshev filters next to other common kind of filters obtained with the same number of coefficients:
As is clear from the image, Chebyshev filters are sharper than the
Butterworth filter; they are not as sharp as the
elliptic one, but they show fewer ripples over the bandwidth.
See also
★
Bessel filters
★
Butterworth Filters
★
Comb filters
★
Elliptic filters
References
★
Approximation Methods for Electronic Filter Design, , Richard W., Daniels, McGraw-Hill, 1974, ISBN 0-07-015308-6
★