I saw somewhere (can't recall where) that KF is the most ionic compound. I expected CsF. Does the greater polarizability of Cs allow it to more easily form covalent bonds compared to K? Does this overcome the fact that K being in n = 4 should bond better with F in n = 2?
Answer
Yes, this is a subtle thing.
Using the Pauling electronegativities, one would expect CsF to have the larger electronegativity difference (3.2). So in principal, it should be "more ionic."
Unfortunately, an ionic bond requires separating charge, so $\ce{Cs+F-}$. The problem is that $\ce{Cs+}$ is much larger than $\ce{K+}$ and so the dipole moment for a fully ionic $\ce{Cs+F-}$ would be much larger.
We find that the charge isn't fully separated, likely because of the need to stabilize the large dipole moment.
So some people plot a curve of "% ionic character" as determined by the actual dipole moment vs. the expected dipole moment (i.e, full charge separation). We find that this curve reaches a limit ~75-85% ionic character.
IIRC, I think on that basis LiF is more Ionic than KF.
For more, I really like Bruce Robinson's lecture notes: http://courses.washington.edu/bhrchem/c152/Lec23.pdf via the Internet Archive
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