Abstract
Two prominent models that give the period of a pendulum are the ideal pendulum, utilizing the small angle approximation, and the non-ideal pendulum, utilizing and elliptic integral. These models were compared against each other for pendulums of varying angles across 5 different pendulum lengths. While the ideal pendulum works well for small angles, its accuracy falls off rapidly as the release angle of the pendulum is increased. The elliptic model, while harder to work with, maintains its accuracy at both large and small angles.
