In geometry, a decagon (from the Greek δέκα déka and γωνία gonía, "ten angles") is a ten-sided polygon or 10-gon. The total sum of the interior angles of a simple decagon is 1440°.

Regular decagon

A regular decagon has all sides of equal length and each internal angle will always be equal to 144°. Its Schläfli symbol is {10} and can also be constructed as a truncated pentagon, t{5}, a quasiregular decagon alternating two types of edges.

Side length

The picture shows a regular decagon with side length a and radius R of the circumscribed circle. So the regular decagon can be constructed with ruler and compass. and the base height of (i.e. the length of [M,D]) is and the triangle has the area:.

Area

The area of a regular decagon of side length a is given by: In terms of the apothem r (see also inscribed figure), the area is: In terms of the circumradius R, the area is: An alternative formula is A=2.5da where d is the distance between parallel sides, or the height when the decagon stands on one side as base, or the diameter of the decagon's inscribed circle. By simple trigonometry, and it can be written algebraically as

Construction

As 10 = 2 × 5, a power of two times a Fermat prime, it follows that a regular decagon is constructible using compass and straightedge, or by an edge-bisection of a regular pentagon. An alternative (but similar) method is as follows:

The golden ratio in decagon

Both in the construction with given circumcircle as well as with given side length is the golden ratio dividing a line segment by exterior division the determining construction element.

Symmetry

The regular decagon has Dih10 symmetry, order 20. There are 3 subgroup dihedral symmetries: Dih5, Dih2, and Dih1, and 4 cyclic group symmetries: Z10, Z5, Z2, and Z1. These 8 symmetries can be seen in 10 distinct symmetries on the decagon, a larger number because the lines of reflections can either pass through vertices or edges. John Conway labels these by a letter and group order. Full symmetry of the regular form is r20 and no symmetry is labeled a1. The d****ihedral symmetries are d****ivi****ded depend****ing on whether they pass through vertices (d for d****iagonal) or edges (p for perpend****iculars), and i when reflection lines path through both edges and vertices. Cyclic symmetries in the middle column are labeled as g for their central gyration orders. Each subgroup symmetry allows one or more degrees of freedom for irregular forms. Only the g10 subgroup has no degrees of freedom but can be seen as directed edges. The highest symmetry irregular decagons are d10, an isogonal decagon constructed by five mirrors which can alternate long and short edges, and p10, an isotoxal decagon, constructed with equal edge lengths, but vertices alternating two different internal angles. These two forms are duals of each other and have half the symmetry order of the regular decagon.

Dissection

Coxeter states that every zonogon (a 2m-gon whose opposite sides are parallel and of equal length) can be dissected into m(m-1)/2 parallelograms. In particular this is true for regular polygons with evenly many sides, in which case the parallelograms are all rhombi. For the regular decagon, m=5, and it can be divided into 10 rhombs, with examples shown below. This decomposition can be seen as 10 of 80 faces in a Petrie polygon projection plane of the 5-cube. A dissection is based on 10 of 30 faces of the rhombic triacontahedron. The list defines the number of solutions as 62, with 2 orientations for the first symmetric form, and 10 orientations for the other 6.

Skew decagon

A skew decagon is a skew polygon with 10 vertices and edges but not existing on the same plane. The interior of such a decagon is not generally defined. A skew zig-zag decagon has vertices alternating between two parallel planes. A regular skew decagon is vertex-transitive with equal edge lengths. In 3-dimensions it will be a zig-zag skew decagon and can be seen in the vertices and side edges of a pentagonal antiprism, pentagrammic antiprism, and pentagrammic crossed-antiprism with the same D5d, [2+,10] symmetry, order 20. These can also be seen in these four convex polyhedra with icosahedral symmetry. The polygons on the perimeter of these projections are regular skew decagons.

Petrie polygons

The regular skew decagon is the Petrie polygon for many higher-dimensional polytopes, shown in these orthogonal projections in various Coxeter planes: The number of sides in the Petrie polygon is equal to the Coxeter number, h, for each symmetry family.