AbstractFor electron energies from direct ionisation threshold up to several eV above cross sections for the production of He+, He2+, Ne+up to Ne4+, Kr2+, Kr3+and Xe2+up to Xe4+ions by single electron impact on atoms were measured. By a least square fit a power law was fitted to the cross sections. The exponents obtained by this procedure are compared with several models, i.e. a simple phase‐space calculation, the Wannier model considering interelectronic repulsion and a statistical approach similar to Russek's statistical energy deposition model. We find that especially ionisation of many‐electron atoms to high degrees of ionisation can not be described by the Wannier model, however, within the statistical appro