Abstract—This paper deals with maximizing the spurious free dynamic range (SFDR), while minimizing the power consumption of sine-wave approximation circuits used in direct digital frequency synthesizers (DDFSs). A novel 16-segment parabolic approximation is detailed and compared with other recent solutions. The circuit complexity (as number of transistors) is comparable to that of ultra low-power 16-segment piecewise linear approximations, while the SFDR is increased from 72 dBc to 84 dBc