The consequences for the structures of coordination polymers of introducing fluoro substituents into the terminal phenyl domain of 4′-(biphenyl-4-yl)-4,2′:6′,4′′-terpyridine (1) have been investigated. Reaction between Cu(OAc) 2 •H 2 O and 4′-(2′,3′,4′,5′,6′-pentafluorobiphenyl-4-yl)-4,2′:6′,4′′-terpyridine (2) yields the one-dimensional coordination polymer [Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (2)] n which contains paddle-wheel {Cu 2 (OAc) 4 } nodes bridged by ligands 2. The compound is isostructural with [Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (1)] n. When Cu(OAc) 2 •H 2 O reacts with a 1 : 1 mixture of 1 and 2, [Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (1)] n and [Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (2)] n co-crystallize with 1 and 2 disordered over one ligand site; the onedimensional coordination polymer is isostructural with each of [Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (1)] n and [Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (2)] n indicating that replacing H by F substituents in the peripheral arene ring has no effect on the overall solid-state structure: tpy⋯tpy π-stacking is preserved, arene⋯arene π H ⋯π H interactions are replaced by perfluoroarene⋯arene π F ⋯π H interactions, and H⋯H contacts are replaced by H⋯F interactions. In stark contrast to the latter observations, the reaction of Zn(OAc) 2 •2H 2 O with perfluoro derivative 2 yields [Zn 5 (OAc) 10 (2) 4 •11H 2 O] n as the dominant onedimensional polymer; minor amounts of the anticipated polymer [Zn 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (2)] n are also formed. The solid-state structure of [Zn 5 (OAc) 10 (2) 4 •11H 2 O] n consists of quadruple-stranded polymer chains assembled from {Zn 5 (2) 4 } subchains interconnected by {Zn 5 (OAc) 10 } units. Within each chain, π F ⋯π F and π H ⋯π H stacking interactions are dominant, while the observed assembly of chains into sheets and π-stacking between arene units in adjacent sheets mimic the dominant interactions in the single-stranded chains observed in [Zn 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (1)] n , [Zn 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (2)] n , [Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (1)] n , [Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (2)] n and [Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (1)] n •[Cu 2 (μ-OAc) 4 (2)] n .