Computing · 1837

Analytical Engine

The first design for a general-purpose, programmable computer.

Babbage's design separated a 'store' (memory) from a 'mill' (processor), read programs from punched cards and supported conditional branching. It was never built, yet its architecture anticipated the modern computer by a century.

See it in the living tree Wikipedia

Arcs above join it to what it stood on, arcs below to what it led to. The bar places this stretch on the tree's whole timeline.

What it built on 2

Difference engine 1822
Jacquard punched cards 1804

What it led to 2

Lovelace on machine thought 1843
Lovelace's Note G 1843

Related measurements

The dashed line marks when it first worked.

Computation per constant dollar, 1850-2006 Latest: 7.3B million units of computer power per 2006 $ (2003) Source: Nordhaus 2007, Two Centuries of Productivity Growth in Computing, J. Econ. Hist. 67(1), Table 6

Fastest computer in the world Latest: 2.2×10¹⁸ operations per second (2026) Source: Wikipedia: List of fastest computers; Wikipedia: History of supercomputing