The degradation (fatigue) of dielectric properties of ferroelectric Pb(ZrxTi1-x)O-3 (PZT) and SrBi2Ta2O9 thin films during cycling was investigated. PZT and SrBi2Ta2O9 thin films were fabricated by metalorganic decomposition and pulsed laser deposition, respectively. Samples with electrodes of platinum (Pt) and ruthenium oxide (RuO2) were studied. The interfacial capacitance (if any) at the Pt/PZT, RuO2/PZT, and Pt/SrBi2Ta2O9 interfaces was determined from the thickness dependence of low-field dielectric permittivity (epsilon(r)) measurements. It was observed that a low epsilon(r) layer existed at the Pt/PZT interface but not at the RuO2/PZT and Pt/SrBi2Ta2O9 interfaces. In the case of Pt/PZT, the capacitance of this interfacial layer decreases with increasing fatigue while the epsilon(r) of the bulk PZT film remains constant. This indicates that fatigue increases the interfacial layer thickness and/or decreases interfacial layer permittivity, but does not change the bulk properties. For the capacitors with RuO2/PZT/RuO2 and Pt/SrBi2Ta2O9/Pt structures, however, the epsilon(r) does not change with ferroelectric film thickness or fatigue cycling. This implies no interfacial layer exists at the interfaces and which can be correlated to the observed nonfatigue effect. Additionally, the equivalent energy-band diagrams of these different capacitor structures were proposed to complement the proposed fatigue mechanism. (C) 1995 American Institute of Physics.