The carbon–fluorine bond stretching appears in the infrared spectrum between 1000 and 1360 cm. The wide range is due to the sensitivity of the stretching frequency to other substituents in the molecule. Monofluorinated compounds have a strong band between 1000 and 1110 cm; with more than one fluorine atoms, the band splits into two bands, one for the symmetric mode and one for the asymmetric. The carbon–fluorine bands are so strong that they may obscure any carbon–hydrogen bands that might be present.
Organofluorine compounds can also be characterized using NMR spectroscopy, using carbon-13, fluorine-19 (the only natural fluorine isotope), or hydrogen-1 (if present). The chemical shifts in F NMR appear over a very wide range, depending on the degree of substitution and functional group. The table below shows the ranges for some of the major classes.