The Most Influential People Across History
Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines
Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.
Students and researchers now have a fast and reliable way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you want to find history’s most influential philsosophers, or the world’s most influential mathematicians currently, now you can.
We also provide custom rankings of people by discipline as well as interviews with influential academics who are currently active.
To use this tool, select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) relevant to your research, and specify influential academics by history, world, or US. Even results that are counterintuitive are often enlightening (our algorithm always picks up a signal).
Methodology: How and Why We Rank by Influence …
See additional learning tools, study tips, features on campus life and much more at our Student Resources Headquarters.
List of the most influential people
#21451
Anne Lamott
#21462
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Anne Lamott is an American novelist and non-fiction writer. She is also a progressive political activist, public speaker, and writing teacher. Lamott is based in Marin County, California. Her nonfiction works are largely autobiographical. Lamott's writings, marked by their self-deprecating humor and openness, cover such subjects as alcoholism, single-motherhood, depression, and Christianity.
Go to Profile#21452
Stan Smith
#21463
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
Stanley Roger Smith is an American former professional tennis player. A world No. 1 player and two-time major singles champion , Smith also paired with Bob Lutz to create one of the most successful doubles teams of all-time. In 1970, Smith won the inaugural year-end championships title. In 1972, he was the year-end world No. 1 singles player. In 1973, he won his second and last year end championship title at the Dallas WCT Finals. In addition, he won four Grand Prix Championship Series titles. In his early years he improved his tennis game through lessons from Pancho Segura, the Pasadena Tennis Patrons, and the sponsorship of the Southern California Tennis Association headed by Perry T.
Go to Profile#21453
Harriet Baber
#21464
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Harriet Baber is a professor of philosophy at the University of San Diego. She holds a Ph.D from Johns Hopkins University, 1980. Her research interests are in analytic metaphysics, philosophical theology, feminism and philosophy of economics. In addition, Baber writes for The Guardian and is a regular columnist for Church Times . She is an Episcopalian.
Go to Profile#21454
Kathy Bates
#21465
Overall Influence
1948 - Present (78 years)
Kathleen Doyle Bates is an American actress. Known for her roles in comedic and dramatic films and television programs, she has received various accolades throughout her career spanning over five decades, including an Academy Award, two Emmy Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, and two Screen Actors Guild Awards as well as nominations for a Tony Award and two BAFTA Awards.
Go to Profile#21455
Raghu Raj Bahadur
#21466
Overall Influence
1924 - 1997 (73 years)
Raghu Raj Bahadur was an Indian statistician considered by peers to be "one of the architects of the modern theory of mathematical statistics". Biography Bahadur was born in Delhi, India, and received his BA and MA in mathematics from St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi . He received his doctorate from the University of North Carolina under Herbert Robbins in 1950 after which he joined University of Chicago. He worked as a research statistician at the Indian Statistical Institute in Calcutta from 1956 to 1961. He spent the remainder of his academic career in the University of Chicago.
Go to Profile#21456
Adrian Smith
#21467
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (69 years)
Adrian Frederick Smith is an English guitarist and singer best known as a member of heavy metal band Iron Maiden, for whom he also writes songs and performs backing vocals both live and in the studio.
Go to Profile#21457
Torsten Husén
#21468
Overall Influence
1916 - 2009 (93 years)
Torsten Husén was a Swedish educator. Husén became Master of Arts in 1938, was an assistant at the Department of Psychology at Lund University from 1938 to 1943, became Doctor of Philosophy in Lund in 1944, and Associate Professor of Education at Stockholm University in 1947. He was professor of education and educational psychology at Stockholm University 1953–1955, 1956–1971 in practical pedagogy at Stockholm Institute of Education and in education at Stockholm University from 1971 to 1981.
Go to Profile#21458
Stephen J. O'Brien
#21469
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (82 years)
Stephen J. O'Brien is an American geneticist. He is known for his research contributions in comparative genomics, virology, genetic epidemiology, mammalian systematics and species conservation. Member of the National Academy of Sciences and a Foreign Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Author or co-author of over 850 scientific articles and the editor of fourteen volumes.
Go to Profile#21459
Catherine Merridale
#21470
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (67 years)
Catherine Anne Merridale, FBA is a British writer and historian with a special interest in Russian history. Early life and education Merridale was born on 12 October 1959 to Philip and Anne Merridale. She was educated at Andover Grammar School, a state school in Andover, Hampshire, and at Cricklade College, a further education college that is also in Andover. She studied history at King's College, Cambridge, graduating with a first class Bachelor of Arts degree in 1982. She continued her studies at the Centre for Russian and East European Studies of the University of Birmingham, and completed her Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1987.
Go to Profile#21460
Adela Cortina
#21471
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
Adela Cortina is a Spanish philosopher. Biography After studying philosophy and letters in the Universidad de Valencia, she was admitted into the department of metaphysics in 1969. In 1976, she defended her doctoral thesis on the notion of God in Kant's transcendental philosophy and during some time she taught at middle schools and highschools. A research scholarship allowed her to go to the University of Munich, where she got acquainted with critical rationalism, pragmatism and marxist ethics and, more concretely, with the philosophy of Jürgen Habermas and Karl-Otto Apel. Upon coming back to the Spanish scholar scene, she devoted her research time to ethics.
Go to Profile#21461
Anna Christina Nobre
#21472
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (63 years)
Anna Christina Nobre FBA, MAE, fNASc is a Brazilian and British cognitive neuroscientist working at Yale University in New Haven, CT, USA. Nobre is a Wu Tsai Professor at Yale University, where she directs the Center for Neurocognition and Behavior at the Wu Tsai Institute. She is an honorary member of the Departments of Psychiatry and Experimental Psychology at the University of Oxford; an honorary fellow of New College, Oxford; and an adjunct professor at the Mesulam Center for Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer's Disease at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.
Go to Profile#21462
Satya Vrat Shastri
#21473
Overall Influence
1930 - 2021 (91 years)
Satya Vrat Shastri was an Indian Sanskrit scholar, writer, grammarian and poet. He wrote three Mahakavyas, three Khandakavyas, one Prabandhakavyas and one Patrakavya and five works in critical writing in Sanskrit. His important works are Ramakirtimahakavyam, Brahattaram Bharatam, Sribodhisattvacharitam, Vaidika Vyakarana, Sarmanyadesah Sutram Vibhati, and "Discovery of Sanskrit Treasures" in seven volumes.
Go to Profile#21463
Marijn Heule
#21474
Overall Influence
1979 - Present (47 years)
Marienus Johannes Hendrikus Heule is a Dutch computer scientist at Carnegie Mellon University who studies SAT solvers. Heule has used these solvers to resolve mathematical conjectures such as the Boolean Pythagorean triples problem, Schur's theorem number 5, and Keller's conjecture in dimension seven.
Go to Profile#21464
Braun Strowman
#21475
Overall Influence
1983 - Present (43 years)
Adam Joseph Scherr is an American professional wrestler and former strongman. He is currently signed to WWE, where he performs on the Raw brand under the ring name Braun Strowman. He is also in a tag team with Ricochet, but is currently inactive due to having neck surgery.
Go to Profile#21465
Manoj Muntashir
#21476
Overall Influence
1976 - Present (50 years)
Manoj Shukla , better known by his stage name Manoj Shukla Muntashir, is an Indian lyricist, poet, dialogue writer and screenwriter. He wrote several Hindi songs for films, including "Teri Mitti", "Galliyan", "Tere Sang Yaara", "Kaun Tujhe", "Dil Meri Na Sune", "Kaise Hua" and "Phir Bhi Tumko Chaahunga".
Go to Profile#21466
Daniele C. Struppa
#21477
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Daniele C. Struppa is an Italian mathematician, academic, and the 13th President of Chapman University in Orange County, California. Prior to assuming the Office of the President, Struppa was Chancellor at Chapman University for nine years and had also served as provost.
Go to Profile#21467
Paul Haeberli
#21478
Overall Influence
Paul E. Haeberli is an American computer graphics programmer and researcher. Biography Paul Haeberli studied for a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, United States.
Go to Profile#21468
Marvin Harrison
#21479
Overall Influence
1972 - Present (54 years)
Marvin Darnell Harrison Sr. is an American former professional football player who was a wide receiver for 13 seasons with the Indianapolis Colts of the National Football League , playing much of it with quarterback Peyton Manning. He played college football for the Syracuse Orange and was selected by Colts in the first round of the 1996 NFL Draft.
Go to Profile#21469
Rop Gonggrijp
#21480
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (58 years)
Robbert Valentijn Gonggrijp is a Dutch hacker and one of the founders of XS4ALL. Biography Gonggrijp was born in Amsterdam. While growing up in Wormer in the Dutch Zaanstreek area, he became known as a teenage hacker and appeared as one of the main characters in Jan Jacobs's book Kraken en Computers which describes the early hacker scene in the Netherlands. Moved to Amsterdam in 1988. Founded the hacker magazine Hack-Tic in 1989. He was believed to be a major security threat by authorities in the Netherlands and the United States. In the masthead of Hack-Tic, Gonggrijp described his role as hoofdverdachte .
Go to Profile#21470
Hrant Dink
#21481
Overall Influence
1954 - 2007 (53 years)
Hrant Dink was a Turkish-Armenian intellectual, editor-in-chief of Agos, journalist, and columnist. As editor-in-chief of the bilingual Turkish-Armenian newspaper Agos, Dink was a prominent member of the Armenian minority in Turkey best known for advocating Turkish–Armenian reconciliation and human and minority rights in Turkey. He was often critical of both Turkey's denial of the Armenian genocide and of the Armenian diaspora's campaign for its international recognition. Dink was prosecuted three times for denigrating Turkishness, while receiving numerous death threats from Turkish nationali...
Go to Profile#21471
David Tse
#21482
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
David Tse is the Thomas Kailath and Guanghan Xu Professor of Engineering at Stanford University. Education Tse earned a B.S. in systems design engineering from University of Waterloo in 1989, an M.S. in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1991, and a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from MIT in 1994. As a postdoctoral student he was a staff member at AT&T Bell Laboratories.
Go to Profile#21472
Paul Tiyambe Zeleza
#21483
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Paul Tiyambe Zeleza is a Malawian historian, literary critic, novelist, short-story writer and blogger at The Zeleza Post. He was president of the African Studies Association. He was the Vice-President for Academic Affairs at Quinnipiac University. He served as Vice Chancellor of the United States International University Africa from 2016 to 2021, located in Nairobi, Kenya. He served as Associate Provost and North Star Distinguished Professor at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio from 2021 to 2023, and was appointed to his current position as Senior Advisor for Strategic Init...
Go to Profile#21473
James D. Hamilton
#21484
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
James Douglas Hamilton is an American econometrician currently teaching at University of California, San Diego. His work is especially influential in time series and energy economics. He received his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley in 1983.
Go to Profile#21474
Dwight Harken
#21485
Overall Influence
1910 - 1993 (83 years)
Dwight Emary Harken was an American surgeon. He was an innovator in heart surgery and introduced the concept of the intensive care unit. Life Dwight Harken was born in Osceola, Iowa. He received his Bachelor's and Medical degrees from Harvard. While working at the Bellevue hospital in New York, he was awarded a fellowship to London to continue his studies in medicine.
Go to Profile#21475
Keira Knightley
#21486
Overall Influence
1985 - Present (41 years)
Keira Christina Knightley is an English actress. Known for her work in both independent films and blockbusters, particularly period dramas, she has received several accolades, including nominations for two Academy Awards, three British Academy Film Awards, and a Laurence Olivier Award. In 2018, she was appointed an OBE at Buckingham Palace for services to drama and charity.
Go to Profile#21476
William J. Mitsch
#21487
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
William Mitsch, born March 29, 1947, in Wheeling, West Virginia, US, is an ecosystem ecologist and ecological engineer who was co-laureate of the 2004 Stockholm Water Prize in August 2004 as a result of a career in wetland ecology and restoration, ecological engineering, and ecological modelling.
Go to Profile#21477
John Turner
#21488
Overall Influence
1947 - 2011 (64 years)
John Charles Turner was a British social psychologist who, along with colleagues, developed the self-categorization theory. Amongst other things, the theory states that the self is not a foundational aspect of cognition, but rather that the self is an outcome of cognitive processes and an interaction between the person and the social context. The self-categorization theory was developed as a companion theory to the social identity theory, and the two theories taken together are known as the social identity approach.
Go to Profile#21478
Hani Rashid
#21489
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Hani Rashid is an architect and educator. He co-founded the New York-based architecture firm, Asymptote Architecture with Lise Anne Couture. Early life and education Hani Rashid was born in Cairo, Egypt in 1958, his family immigrated to Ontario, Canada when he was young. His brother is industrial designer, Karim Rashid.
Go to Profile#21479
Sujit Choudhry
#21490
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (56 years)
Sujit Choudhry is a lawyer, legal scholar, and expert in comparative constitutional law. Choudhry was on the faculty at the University of Toronto and New York University School of Law before being named dean University of California, Berkeley School of Law. He stepped down from his position as dean in 2016 after being accused of sexually harassing an executive assistant, which he denied, paying a $100,000 settlement but retaining his position on the faculty.
Go to Profile#21480
Amitava Raychaudhuri
#21491
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (74 years)
Amitava Raychaudhuri is an Indian theoretical particle physicist. He is Professor Emeritus at the Physics Department of the Science College, University of Calcutta where he earlier held the Sir Tarak Nath Palit Chair Professorship. He is the nephew of another renowned Indian physicist, Amal Kumar Raychaudhuri.
Go to Profile#21481
Mary Wakefield
#21492
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Mary Wakefield is an American nurse and health care administrator, who served in the Obama administration as acting United States Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services from 2015 to 2017, and as head of the Health Resources and Services Administration from 2009 to 2015.
Go to Profile#21482
AJ Styles
#21493
Overall Influence
1977 - Present (49 years)
Allen Neal Jones , better known by his ring name AJ Styles is an American professional wrestler. He is currently signed to WWE, where he performs on the SmackDown brand, and is the leader of The O.C. stable.
Go to Profile#21483
Daniel Bleichenbacher
#21494
Overall Influence
1964 - Present (62 years)
Daniel Bleichenbacher is a Swiss cryptographer, previously a researcher at Bell Labs, and currently employed at Google. He received his Ph.D. from ETH Zurich in 1996 for contributions to computational number theory, particularly concerning message verification in the ElGamal and RSA public-key cryptosystems. His doctoral advisor was Ueli Maurer.
Go to Profile#21484
Han Dayuan
#21495
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (66 years)
Han Dayuan is Professor of Constitutional Law and the Dean of Renmin University of China Law School. He is also the President of the Chinese Constitutional Law Society. Biography Han Dayuan was born in a Korean family in Jilin, China. He received his LL.B degree from Jilin University in 1984, and his LL.M degree from Renmin University of China Law School in 1987, after which he joined the faculty of Renmin University Law School. In 1994 he received his LL.D from Renmin University. From 1990 to 1991, he was visiting scholar at Kyoto University. In 2001, he was visiting scholar at Harvard Law...
Go to Profile#21485
Michael Reiss
#21496
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Michael J. Reiss is a British bioethicist, educator, and journalist. He is also an Anglican priest. Reiss is professor of science education at the Institute of Education, University College London, where he is assistant director, research and development.
Go to Profile#21486
Ronald de Sousa
#21497
Overall Influence
1940 - Present (86 years)
Ronald Bon de Sousa Pernes is a Swiss-born Canadian philosopher and academic. He is an emeritus professor at the Department of Philosophy of the University of Toronto, which he joined in 1966. Biography De Sousa possesses both UK and Canadian citizenship. Educated in Switzerland and England, he took his B.A. at New College, Oxford University in 1962, and his Ph.D. at Princeton University in 1966. His thesis Categories, Translation, and Linguistic Theory was supervised by Paul Benacerraf.
Go to Profile#21487
Ottmar Hitzfeld
#21498
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (77 years)
Ottmar Hitzfeld is a German former professional football player and manager. He accumulated a total of 18 major titles, mostly in his tenures with Grasshopper Club Zürich, Borussia Dortmund and Bayern Munich.
Go to Profile#21488
Jessica Helfand
#21499
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (66 years)
Jessica Helfand is a designer, author, and educator. She is a former contributing editor and columnist for Print, Eye and Communications Arts magazine, and founding editor of the website Design Observer. She is Senior Critic at Yale School of Art since 1994, a lecturer in Yale College, and Artist-in-Residence at Yale’s Institute for Network Science. Named the first Henry Wolf Resident in design at the American Academy in Rome in 2010, she is a member of the Alliance Graphique Internationale and the Art Director’s Hall of Fame. In 2013, she won the AIGA medal.
Go to Profile#21489
Shabana Azmi
#21500
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Shabana Azmi is an Indian actress of film, television and theatre. Her career in the Hindi film industry has spanned over 160 films, mostly within independent and neorealist parallel cinema, though her work extended to mainstream films as well as a number of international projects. One of India's most acclaimed actresses, Azmi is known for her portrayals of distinctive, often unconventional female characters across several genres. She has won a record five National Film Awards for Best Actress, in addition to five Filmfare Awards and several international accolades. The Government of India ho...
Go to Profile#21490
James Duncan Davidson
#21501
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (56 years)
James Duncan Davidson is an American software developer and photographer. He's currently the Technology Advisor to Tobias Lütke, CEO of Shopify. While a software engineer at Sun Microsystems , Davidson created Tomcat, a Java-based webserver application and the Ant Java-based build tool. Davidson is the author or co-author of several books on both using and writing software, including Learning Cocoa with Objective-C, Cocoa in a Nutshell, Running Mac OS X Panther, and Mac OS X Panther Hacks, all published by O’Reilly Media. He also contributed to Agile Web Development with Rails, published by Th...
Go to Profile#21491
Ron Carter
#21502
Overall Influence
1937 - Present (89 years)
Ronald Levin Carter is an American jazz double bassist. His appearances on 2,221 recording sessions make him the most-recorded jazz bassist in history. He has won three Grammy awards, and is also a cellist who has recorded numerous times on that instrument.
Go to Profile#21492
Dann Huff
#21503
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (66 years)
Dann Lee Huff is an American record producer, studio musician and songwriter. For his work as a producer in the country music genre, he has won several awards, including the Musician of the Year award in 2001, 2004, and 2016 at the Country Music Association Awards and the Producer of the Year award in 2006 and 2009 at the Academy of Country Music. He is the father of American singer and songwriter Ashlyne Huff a member of Giant and White Heart and brother of drummer David Huff.
Go to Profile#21493
Joseph Cotten
#21504
Overall Influence
1905 - 1994 (89 years)
Joseph Cheshire Cotten Jr. was an American film, stage, radio and television actor. Cotten achieved prominence on Broadway, starring in the original stage productions of The Philadelphia Story and Sabrina Fair . He then gained worldwide fame for his collaborations with Orson Welles films on three films, Citizen Kane , The Magnificent Ambersons , and Journey into Fear , for which Cotten starred in and was also credited with the screenplay.
Go to Profile#21494
Yulij Ilyashenko
#21505
Overall Influence
1943 - Present (83 years)
Yulij Sergeevich Ilyashenko is a Russian mathematician, specializing in dynamical systems, differential equations, and complex foliations. Ilyashenko received in 1969 from Moscow State University his Russian candidate degree under Evgenii Landis. Ilyashenko was a professor at Moscow State University, an academic at Steklov Institute, and also taught at the Independent University of Moscow. He became a professor at Cornell University.
Go to Profile#21495
Alexander Razborov
#21506
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (63 years)
Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Razborov , sometimes known as Sasha Razborov, is a Soviet and Russian mathematician and computational theorist. He is Andrew McLeish Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago.
Go to Profile#21496
Joe Maddon
#21507
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Joseph John Maddon is an American former professional baseball manager and coach. He has managed the Tampa Bay Rays, Chicago Cubs, and Los Angeles Angels of Major League Baseball . After playing and coaching in the minor leagues, Maddon began his MLB coaching career with the Angels in 1994 and served under managers Buck Rodgers, Marcel Lachemann, John McNamara, Terry Collins, and Mike Scioscia. He served two stints as interim manager during this time. He managed the Rays from 2006 through 2014, winning the 2008 American League pennant.
Go to Profile#21497
Mahmoud Farshchian
#21508
Overall Influence
1930 - Present (96 years)
Mahmoud Farshchian is an Iranian painter and educator. He was a master of Persian miniature painting. His paintings have been hosted by several museums and exhibitions worldwide. Early life and education Mahmoud Farshchian was born on January 24, 1930, in the city of Isfahan, Pahlavi Iran. Farshchian’s father, Gholamreza, was a Persian carpet merchant. His mother, Zahra, would often take Farshchian and his siblings to the Immamzadeh Ismael in Isfahan. Farshchian’s childhood home had an area called the Chicken House, where he played with birds like sparrows, hens, and roosters. Birds are an element Farshchian often uses in his pieces, relating to his childhood memories.
Go to Profile#21498
Yuen-Ron Shen
#21509
Overall Influence
1935 - Present (91 years)
Yuen-Ron Shen is a Chinese physicist. He is a professor emeritus of physics at the University of California, Berkeley, known for his work on non-linear optics. He was born in Shanghai and graduated from National Taiwan University. He received his Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Harvard under physicist and Nobel Laureate Nicolaas Bloembergen in 1963, and joined the department of physics at Berkeley in 1964. In the early years, Shen was probably best known for his work on self-focusing and filament propagation of laser beams in materials. These fundamental studies enabled the creation of ultrafast supercontinuum light sources.
Go to Profile#21499
Jochen Mass
#21510
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
Jochen Richard Mass is a German former racing driver. Life and career Born in Dorfen, Bavaria 50 km from Munich, Mass participated in 114 Formula One World Championship Grands Prix, debuting on 14 July 1973 at the British Grand Prix. He won one GP race , secured no pole positions, achieved 8 podiums and scored a total of 71 championship points.
Go to Profile#21500
Glenn D. Walters
#21511
Overall Influence
Glenn Walters is an American forensic psychologist and associate professor of Criminal Justice at Kutztown University in Pennsylvania. He worked for three decades in federal government as a clinical psychologist and drug program coordinator for military and federal prison inmates. He has published widely in criminology, including addiction.
Go to Profile