Abstract: Provisional data of the atomic average van der Waals radii including all common metal elements in crystals are proposed, which is derived from the available data of the average atom volume in crystals. Average volume of elements at 298 K was obtained by a statistical analysis of the Cambridge Structural Database. The present van der Waals radii are compared with the other systems proposed previously by Pauling, Bondi, Batsanov, Allinger or Zefirov. The van der Waals radii of lanthanide and actinide elements are peculiar to the other systems since they have never appeared in literature. It is worthy to note that all the radii presented in this work are more suitable to organic and metal-organic compounds. Moreover, the characteristics of this system, some current problems of van der Waals radii application and further study in this area are also discussed.

Key words: Average atomic volumes, van der Waals radii, Secondary bonding