Measurements have been made of the electrical characteristics of Schottky barriers made by evaporating films of various metals (Al, Pb, Ni, Au, Ag, Cu) onto p-type silicon. The barriers were generally lower than on n-type silicon, and in the case of Au the barrier was so low as to provide an effectively ohmic contact at room temperature. The truly exponential portion of the forward I– V characteristic was restricted to a comparatively small voltage range. Within this range ‘ n’ values of about 1.10 were obtained. The reverse characteristics could be explained in terms of generation in the depletion region. The variation of barrier height with metal work-function indicates that the surface-state parameters (density of states and position of neutral level) are essentially the same for p-type as for n-type silicon. This is confirmed by the fact that, for a given metal, the sum of the barrier heights on n-type and p-type silicon is approximately equal to the band-gap.