When was each element discovered?

People have used some elements, such as gold, copper and iron, for thousands of years. Most of the rest were found in a burst of activity between 1750 and 1900, as chemists learned to separate and test substances. Since 1940, every new element has been made by people, in reactors or particle accelerators.

Known since ancient times (11)

carbon, sulfur, iron, copper, arsenic, silver, tin, antimony, gold, mercury, lead.

Before 1700 (1)

phosphorus 1669.

1700 to 1799 (20)

cobalt 1735, platinum 1735, zinc 1746, nickel 1751, bismuth 1753, hydrogen 1766, nitrogen 1772, oxygen 1774, chlorine 1774, manganese 1774, molybdenum 1778, tellurium 1782, tungsten 1783, zirconium 1789, uranium 1789, strontium 1790, titanium 1791, yttrium 1794, chromium 1797, beryllium 1798.

1800 to 1849 (26)

vanadium 1801, niobium 1801, tantalum 1802, rhodium 1803, palladium 1803, cerium 1803, osmium 1803, iridium 1803, sodium 1807, potassium 1807, boron 1808, magnesium 1808, calcium 1808, barium 1808, iodine 1811, lithium 1817, selenium 1817, cadmium 1817, silicon 1824, aluminium 1825, bromine 1826, ruthenium 1827, thorium 1828, lanthanum 1839, terbium 1843, erbium 1843.

1850 to 1899 (24)

caesium 1860, rubidium 1861, thallium 1861, indium 1863, helium 1868, gallium 1875, holmium 1878, ytterbium 1878, scandium 1879, samarium 1879, thulium 1879, gadolinium 1880, praseodymium 1885, neodymium 1885, fluorine 1886, germanium 1886, dysprosium 1886, argon 1894, neon 1898, krypton 1898, xenon 1898, polonium 1898, radium 1898, actinium 1899.

1900 to 1949 (15)

radon 1900, europium 1901, lutetium 1907, protactinium 1913, hafnium 1923, rhenium 1925, technetium 1937, francium 1939, astatine 1940, neptunium 1940, plutonium 1940, americium 1944, curium 1944, promethium 1945, berkelium 1949.

1950 to 1999 (16)

californium 1950, einsteinium 1952, fermium 1952, mendelevium 1955, nobelium 1957, lawrencium 1961, rutherfordium 1964, dubnium 1967, seaborgium 1974, bohrium 1976, meitnerium 1982, hassium 1984, darmstadtium 1994, roentgenium 1994, copernicium 1996, flerovium 1998.

2000 onwards (5)

livermorium 2000, moscovium 2003, nihonium 2004, oganesson 2006, tennessine 2010.

What drove each wave?

• 1700s: careful weighing and the study of gases revealed hydrogen, nitrogen and oxygen.
• Early 1800s: electricity from batteries let Humphry Davy split compounds and isolate sodium, potassium, calcium and others.
• 1860 onwards: the spectroscope showed each element's own coloured lines, which revealed caesium, rubidium, helium and more.
• 1890s: the noble gases were separated from air, and radioactivity led to polonium and radium.
• After 1940: elements beyond uranium were made by firing particles at heavy atoms.

Years are from PubChem, with four corrected by us (see About). Sources sometimes differ by a few years, because finding and confirming an element were often separate events.