The Greatest Inventions of All Time, Ranked
All 16 inventions here, ranked by 58 players. Electricity leads: it wins 75.3% of its matchups (n = 170) and was champion in 16 of 58 brackets. Disagree? Your first pick is right here. No sign-up.
Size
Penicillin1928
Smartphone2007 (iPhone)
Tap a poster to make your pick. Crowd numbers appear after you choose.
Greatest Inventions: the community’s best
Win rate across 870 head-to-head picks from 58 finished brackets. n is the number of matchups behind each win rate; only entrants with 30 or more are listed.
| # | Invention | W–L | Win rate | vs .500 | Titles | n |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Electricity1879 (light bulb) | 128–42 | 75.3% | 16 | 170 | |
| 2 | 100–46 | 68.5% | 12 | 146 | ||
| 3 | The Internet1983 | 102–51 | 66.7% | 7 | 153 | |
| 4 | 96–51 | 65.3% | 7 | 147 | ||
| 5 | 64–55 | 53.8% | 3 | 119 | ||
| 6 | 53–56 | 48.6% | 2 | 109 | ||
| 7 | 46–56 | 45.1% | 2 | 102 | ||
| 8 | Printing Press1440 | 37–54 | 40.7% | 4 | 91 |
Greatest Inventions: the community tier list
From 870 head-to-head picks in 58 finished brackets. Placed by win rate, steadied toward 50% for entrants with few matchups: S is 75% or more, A 60%, B 50%, C 40%, D 25%.
Stier, win rate 75% or more
- Nobody yet
Atier, win rate 60% or more
- Electricity
- The Wheel
- The Internet
- Vaccines
Btier, win rate 50% or more
- Computer
Ctier, win rate 40% or more
- Smartphone
- Automobile
- Printing Press
- Telephone
- Penicillin
Dtier, win rate 25% or more
- GPS
- Television
- Steam Engine
- Camera
- Compass
- Airplane
Ftier, win rate 0% or more
- Nobody yet
How the Greatest Inventions bracket works
This invention ranking is played, not dragged into rows. You get one matchup at a time — The Internet or Printing Press? Electricity or The Wheel? — and after 15 picks the bracket has a champion, with everything else placed by how far it got. The awkward pairings are the point: they are the calls a drag-and-drop tier list quietly lets you avoid.
This bracket runs 4 rounds at the default 16-slot size (Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, Final), with every one of the 16 options in the field. Entrants are drawn by a seed that changes daily, and New draw picks a fresh one, so an early upset in one run may never happen in the next. You can also play it at 8 slots for a shorter or longer run.
15 picks, 4 rounds
- Round of 168 matchups
- Quarterfinals4 matchups
- Semifinals2 matchups
- Final1 matchup
Roughly 1-2 minutes start to finish at the default size.
All 16 entrants
All 16 entrants are listed below, including The Internet, Printing Press, Electricity and The Wheel. Updated
- The Internet1983Illustration: The Opte Project / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY 2.5
- Printing Press1440Photo: [International Printing Museum] / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY 2.0
- Electricity1879 (light bulb)Photo: mattbuck ( category ) / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
- The Wheel~3500 BCPhoto: Bybbisch94, Christian Gebhardt / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
- Smartphone2007 (iPhone)Photo: Sage Ross / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
- Penicillin1928
- Airplane1903Photo: Jules Meulemans / Wikimedia Commons · GFDL
- Telephone1876Photo: Berthold Werner / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0
- Television1927
- Automobile1886
- Computer1945
- Steam Engine1712Photo: Petar Milošević / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
- Vaccines1796
- Compass~1100Photo: Jacek Halicki / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
- Camera1816Photo: Kameraprojekt Graz 2015 / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
- GPS1978
Tier list instead?
Load all 16 into the tier list maker and sort them into S through F yourself: same entrants, no matchups.
Open the tier list makerMissing something?
Build your own invention bracket with exactly the entrants you want, then share the link.
Open the bracket makerGetting a ranking you actually agree with
- Trust the first instinct. Overthinking a matchup usually produces a ranking you do not agree with later.
- The default run puts all 16 options in the draw. Short on time? Drop to 8 slots — a quicker run over a random 8 of them.
- Watch for the option you keep beating reluctantly. That is usually the sign you should undo and reconsider the pick before it.
Questions people ask
What is the best invention?
According to 58 BracketRanker players, Electricity (1879 (light bulb)). It wins 75.3% of its head-to-head matchups (n = 170) and was champion in 16 of 58 brackets (27.6%).
How many options are in the Greatest Inventions bracket?
The pool holds 16 options. A default run puts all of them in the draw and takes 15 picks across 4 rounds: Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, Final. Other field sizes are available too — 8, 16 slots.
Which options are included?
The Internet, Printing Press, Electricity, The Wheel, Smartphone, Penicillin, Airplane, Telephone, Television, Automobile, Computer and Steam Engine, plus 4 more. Every entrant is listed further down this page with its artwork.
How long does the Greatest Inventions bracket take?
About 1-2 minutes — 15 choices at the default size, or 7 if you drop to an 8-slot bracket. No account is needed, and a run saves after every pick, so you can stop and jump back in later.
Can I turn the result into S/A/B tiers?
Both are here, and the bracket is closer to a tier list than it looks. It ends with a champion, a runner-up and then every other option grouped by the round it went out in — which is exactly a set of tiers, decided by 15 direct comparisons rather than by your first guess at a layout. What it deliberately does not do is claim a precise gap between two options that never met. If you would rather place the options into S through F rows yourself, the tier list maker loads all 16 of them at bracketranker.com/tier-list-maker.
Can I compare my order with other people's?
Every completed bracket feeds the Greatest Inventions community results page, which aggregates win rates across all plays and tracks how often each of the 16 entrants takes the title. It updates continuously, so it moves as more people play.
What if a option I wanted is missing?
Use the bracket maker: add your own options, name it, and share the link so other people play the same field. That is the route to take when this pool of 16 is missing something you would have picked, or when you want a version scoped to one era, label or franchise.