A non-metal is a substance that conducts heat and electricity poorly, is brittle or waxy or gaseous, and cannot be hammered into sheets or drawn into wire Non-metals gain electrons easily to form anions About 20% of the known chemical elements are nonmetals
Any one of the set of elements which, as contrasted with the metals, possess, produce, or receive, acid rather than basic properties; a metalloid; as, oxygen, sulphur, and chlorine are nonmetals