In a dielectric material subjected to an alternating electric field, what effect does a high dielectric constant have on dielectric loss?

A high dielectric constant means the material can store a lot of electric energy, but it also means that more of the alternating field must be accommodated by polarization processes that are not perfectly elastic. Because these processes involve delayed responses of dipoles and conduction, they dissipate energy as heat, which shows up as dielectric loss. The loss tangent, tan δ = ε″/ε′, increases when ε′ is large if the imaginary part ε″ grows with it, so a high ε′ usually raises the loss. For example, a ceramic capacitor with ε′ ≈ 2000 will have a noticeably higher loss tangent than a low‑ε material, even though it stores more charge. Thus, a high dielectric constant typically leads to higher dielectric loss.