The factors affecting the channel mobility of metal–oxide–semiconductor transistors fabricated using as‐deposited rapid thermal chemical vapor deposition (RTCVD) of silicon dioxide are investigated and compared to thermal silicon dioxide at various temperatures. The results indicate that the observed differences in the mobility values of thermal and rapid thermal chemical vapor deposed oxides at channel concentrations where Coulombic scattering is important is due to increased oxide trapping in the RTCVD films. It was also observed that the rapid thermal chemical vapor deposited oxides exhibited slightly larger mobility degradation rates at high fields when compared to thermal oxides. ©1995 American Institute of Physics.