Who has the most IQ of all time?

Who Holds the Title for the Highest IQ?

When it comes to raw intellectual power, few names stand out like Marilyn vos Savant. Recognized by the Guinness World Records for the highest recorded IQ, she scored an astonishing 228 on a standardized test measured using the Stanford-Binet scale. That number, while debated by some psychologists due to variations in testing methods, has cemented her place in popular culture as one of the smartest people alive.

Vos Savant rose to fame in the 1980s not just for her score, but for her Parade magazine column, “Ask Marilyn,” where she tackled complex logic puzzles and answered readers' questions on everything from mathematics to philosophy. Her most famous moment came when she correctly solved the Monty Hall problem—a probability puzzle that even stumped many mathematicians at the time.

Still, she isn’t the only modern mind pushing the limits of human intelligence. Terence Tao, a Fields Medal-winning mathematician, is often cited with an IQ between 225 and 230. Similarly, Christopher Hirata, a child prodigy who began studying astrophysics at Caltech at age 14, reportedly scored around 225.

While IQ scores offer a narrow window into cognitive ability, they don’t capture creativity, emotional intelligence, or wisdom. And yet, figures like vos Savant remind us of the extraordinary potential of the human mind. Her record may stand for now, but the real measure of intelligence often lies not in a number, but in how one uses it.