Sawtooth wave
![A bandlimited sawtooth wave pictured in the time domain (top) and frequency domain (bottom). The fundamental is at 220 Hz (A3).](/Images/godic/202502/09/Sawtooth-td_and_fd5326.png")
![Animation of the additive synthesis of a sawtooth wave with an increasing number of harmonics](/Images/godic/202502/09/Synthesis_sawtooth5326.gif")
![Sine, square, triangle, and sawtooth waveforms](/Images/godic/202502/09/Waveforms.svg5326.png")
The sawtooth wave (or saw wave) is a kind of non-sinusoidal waveform. It is so named based on its resemblance to the teeth of a saw.
The convention is that a sawtooth wave ramps upward and then sharply drops. However, in a "reverse (or inverse) sawtooth wave", the wave ramps downward and then sharply rises. It can also be considered the extreme case of an asymmetric triangle wave.