The optical characteristics of amorphous zinc oxide (a-ZnO) thin films grown by radio frequency reactive magnetron sputtering on various substrates at temperature <325 K have been investigated in the spectral range 340-1600 nm. The amorphous nature of the a-ZnO films was verified by X-ray diffraction and the optical constants were obtained by analysis of the measured ellipsometric spectra using the Cauchy-Urbach model. Refractive indices and extinction coefficients of the films were determined to be in the range 1.67-1.93 and 3.9 x 10(-8)-0.32, respectively. The band edge of the films on Si (100) and quartz has been determined by spectroscopic ellipsometry (3.39 +/- 0.05 eV) and spectrophotometric (3.35 +/- 0.05 eV) methods, respectively. From the angle dependence of the p-polarized reflectivity we deduce a Brewster angle of 60.5 degrees. Measurement of the polarized optical properties shows a high transmissivity (81%-99%) and low absorptivity (<5%) in the visible and near infrared regions at different angles of incidence. Also, we found that there was a higher absorptivity for wavelength <370 nm. This wavelength, similar to 370 nm, therefore indicated that the band edge for a-ZnO thin films is about 3.35 eV. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.