An accelerometer is a tiny mechanical structure on a chip whose deflection under acceleration is read out electrically. At rest it reports gravity, which gives the device’s tilt; in motion it reports changes in velocity, impacts and vibration. Three-axis parts in small packages draw very little current and include wake-on-motion logic, which makes them common in nearly every battery-powered IoT product.
Two applications stand out. In condition monitoring, high-bandwidth accelerometers bolted to motors and pumps capture vibration signatures whose changes predict bearing wear, the sensing basis of much predictive maintenance work. In logistics, a low-power accelerometer tells a tracker when a shipment is moving so it can save energy while it sits still. The main selection parameters are measurement range, bandwidth, noise and current draw, and they pull against each other.
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