Expansion Slot

Alternatively referred to as an expansion port, an expansion slot is a slot located inside a computer on the motherboard or riser board that allows additional boards to be connected to it. For example, if you wanted to install a new video card in the computer you'd purchase a video expansion card and install that card into the compatible expansion slot. Below is a listing of some of the expansion slots commonly found in IBM compatible computers as well as other brands of computers and the devices commonly associated with those slots. Clicking on any of the below links will give you additional details about each expansion slot.

Computer expansion slots

Many of the above expansion card slots are obsolete. You're most likely only going to encounter AGP, PCI, and PCIe when working with computers today. In the below picture, is an example of what expansion slots may look like on a motherboard. In this picture, there are three different types of expansion slots; PCI Express, PCI, and AGP.

Computer motherboard with three types of expansion slots

Also see: Expansion, Expansion card, Motherboard definitions