More accurate expressions for the evaluations of the trap depthEand the capture cross sectionSrelated to the thermally stimulated current process are developed. The differentT−1,T−2,T−3, andT−4dependencies ofSon the temperatureThave been considered for the slow retrapping case. In the fast retrapping case, the energyEand the product &tgr;NThave been expressed independently, where &tgr; is the lifetime of the free electron andNTthe total trap density. The calculations depend on the temperaturesTmandT1that correspond to the peak and the half‐height of the current, respectively. A new experimental method providing the determination ofTmandT1with high precision has been developed that allows extensive experimental examination of thermally stimulated current curves in high‐resistivity CdTe crystals. Application to defect parameters of fourteen levels in CdTe has been carried out in the slow and fast retrapping limits. In the slow retrapping case, the results differ from those obtained by the widely used Grossweiner formula. For the fast retrapping limit the values ofEcorresponding to different sets ofTmandT1are calculated independently of &tgr;NT. This again has not been the case published by the different authors.