A tunnel field effect transistor (TFET) is disclosed. In one aspect, the transistor comprises a gate that does not align with a drain, and only overlap with the source extending at least up to the interface of the source-channel region and optionally overlaps with part of the channel. Due to the shorter gate, the total gate capacitance is reduced, which is directly reflected in an improved switching speed of the device. In addition to the advantage of an improved switching speed, the transistor also has a processing advantage (no alignment of the gate with the drain is necessary), as well as a performance improvement (the ambipolar behavior of the TFET is reduced).