<!-- linked from redirect [[Phase accumulator]] -->
A binary phase accumulator consists of ana N-bit binary [[adder (electronics)|adder]] and a [[hardware register|register]] configured as shown in Figure 1.<ref name="Grzeg"/> Each clock cycle produces a new N-bit output consisting of the previous output obtained from the register summed with the frequency control word (FCW) which is constant for a given output frequency. The resulting output waveform is a staircase with step size <math>\Delta F</math>, the integer value of the FCW.<ref name="ADI"/> In some configurations, the phase output is taken from the output of the register which introduces a one clock cycle [[latency (engineering)|latency]] but allows the adder to operate at a higher clock rate.<ref name="latticeSC" />
