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Metal-oxide arresters (MOA), including the non-gapped MOAs (NG-MOA) and externally-gapped MOAs (EG-MOA), are the main equipment applied to protect the power system against conducted transient electromagnetic disturbances (TED). However, MOAs exhibit quite different electrical characteristics under microsecond-level and nanosecond-level transients. In order to figure out the response of MOAs under nanosecond-level TED, experimental platforms are built which contain a pulse generator with the amplitude of pulse current adjustable from 0 kA to 5 kA and the rise time of 20 ns. Then the dynamic hysteresis loops, the static V-I characteristics, the response time delay and the full response process of five types of 10-kV MOAs are investigated. From the dynamic hysteresis loops of NG-MOAs, the impedance conversion process can be seen clearly and can be explained by the grain-boundary theory. But EG-MOAs has not this conversion process due to the air-gap. And the experimental results demonstrate that there is no noticeable nanosecond-level conduction delay on NG-MOAs whereas the electric field non-uniformity of the air-gap has a significant influence on the time delay of the EG-MOAs. The response time delay of EG-MOAs changes ranging from tens of nanoseconds to hundreds of nanoseconds. This feature makes EG-MOAs more likely to raise insulation risks under nanosecond-level TED compared with NG-MOAs.