Can I design SMD elements on the back of THT?

I'm designing a PCB right now and found out I can save a lot of space using the back of THT elements. Is it legit to design like that? Are there any problems that might occur?

PCB Design
November 24, 2023

If you want to meet CE requirements for noise immunity and emissions, a two-layer board would help a lot.

Generally speaking, there is no problem with putting components on both sides of the board, in the same place. If you had a two (or more) layer board, you’d probably want to put a ground or power plane between them. However, you can’t do that with a single-layer board. So you should watch out for a fast digital chip interfering with an analog circuit. It would be inadvisable.

For example, put a microcontroller on one side and a high input impedance buffer on the other. But putting decoupling caps opposite the chip is probably a good plan.

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Oliver Smith

Oliver is an experienced electronics engineer skilled in PCB design, analog circuits, embedded systems, and prototyping. His deep knowledge spans schematic capture, firmware coding, simulation, layout, testing, and troubleshooting. Oliver excels at taking projects from concept to mass production using his electrical design talents and mechanical aptitude.