Question

How many tangents can be drawn from the point outside the circle?
(a). 1
(b). 2
(c). 3
(d). 0

Answer 1

Hint: First we are going to draw the diagram of the circle. Then we will mark a point outside the circle. After that, we will try to draw tangents to the circle and then we will count them and that will be our final answer.

Complete step-by-step solution -

Let’s start solving this question by first plotting the graph of any circle,

In this figure, we have taken a point C outside the circle with center A. Then we have drawn the two possible tangents from the point C to the circle.
Circle with centre at A and the point C is the outside point and from that we have drawn the maximum number of possible tangents which comes out to be CD and CB, so we cannot draw more than 2 tangents from a point outside the circle and hence the answer is 2.
So, the correct option is (b).

Note: From the given figure the answer is clear but there is another method to solve this question is to assume a equation of circle and a point outside the circle and then we need find the general equation of tangent to circle from the outside point and then using this we will get only two values of slope which will prove that only two tangents can be drawn.