SUMMARY
Shielding principles are essential for guiding the efficient design of effective shields. In this paper, equivalent magnetic dipoles are first introduced to discuss shielding mechanism and characteristics of finite‐width metal plates. It is found that the magnetic field contributed by a plate decays with 1/r2 or 1/r3 generally. Magnetic shielding is effective if both equivalent and source dipoles have the same orientation. Such shielding retains even at infinity. Shielding is ineffective if their orientations are different. In such a case, an edge effect is observed no matter what material the plate is made of. The edge effect of conducting plates can be eliminated if two connected plates are placed around the source. Shielding against a monopole source is observed in the near region, even with a conductive plate. Monopole‐source shielding with a ferromagnetic plate is almost the same as dipole‐source shielding under orthogonal dipole orientations. Impact of other parameters, such as plate location, size and material, is addressed and interpreted physically using the equivalent dipoles. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.