r/todayilearned • u/ubcstaffer123 • 2h ago

TIL Driving for more than two hours each day can steadily decrease the IQ of middle-aged drivers

readersdigest.ca

11.3k Upvotes

860 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Successful-Ear977 • 5h ago

TIL a nationwide US study found that only 42% of dog owners reported walking their dog during a typical week.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

6.3k Upvotes

2.3k comments

r/todayilearned • u/Greene_Mr • 6h ago

TIL about Jim Creighton, who invented modern pitching before the MLB era and who died after his abdomen "snapped" during a game at the age of 21.

en.wikipedia.org

6.9k Upvotes

258 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Initial_Specialist69 • 10h ago

TIL There are "hunger stones" in rivers in central Europe. These stones were carved during droughts to mark the water level as a warning to future generations that they will have to endure famine-related hardships if the water sinks to this level again.

en.wikipedia.org

25.3k Upvotes

376 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ijustwannanap • 6h ago

TIL that Winamp's slogan "It really whips the llama's ass!" comes from the Wesley Willis song "Whip the Llama's Ass". Willis was a schizophrenic musician and artist who released over 48 albums in his lifetime.

en.wikipedia.org

4.7k Upvotes

437 comments

r/todayilearned • u/eleanorharland • 7h ago

TIL a Dutch supermarket chain has "chat checkouts" for customers who aren't in a hurry and want to talk to the cashier. The first opened in 2019 to tackle loneliness among older people, and it was popular enough that the chain announced 200 more.

dutchnews.nl

5.2k Upvotes

164 comments

r/todayilearned • u/a2soup • 1h ago

TIL that the use of incubators to save premature babies was popularized by a Coney Island sideshow that exhibited preemies in incubators for decades before maternity wards adopted the technology. The show was funded by admission fees and saved thousands of babies at no cost to the families.

pbs.org

• Upvotes

34 comments

r/todayilearned • u/eleanorharland • 13h ago

TIL from 1790 until 2015 bakers in Paris had to tell city hall before closing for holiday, so that half the city's bakeries shut in July and the other half in August. The rule was passed after the Revolution to make sure no neighbourhood ever ran out of bread.

npr.org

7.1k Upvotes

135 comments

r/todayilearned • u/YappinZappin • 1h ago

TIL tetraethyllead (TEL) - main component used to make gasoline "leaded" - was selected out of thousands compounds tested mainly for being the cheapest - just 1 part TEL in 1300 parts gasoline was found to be enough to sufficiently reduce "knocking"

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

91 comments

r/todayilearned • u/lmao-bruh-lol • 7h ago

TIL that in 1830, nearly half the students were expelled from Yale University, because they refused to draw their own geometric diagrams on the chalk board for maths exams rather than consult textbooks. This is also known as the Conics Sections Rebellion

mentalfloss.com

1.4k Upvotes

82 comments

r/todayilearned • u/haddock420 • 5h ago

TIL The 1833 Factory Act limited the hours children could work in factories, for children aged 9 to 13, they could work a maximum of 48 hours a week and 8 hours a day.

parliament.uk

909 Upvotes

60 comments

r/todayilearned • u/caulay_mcculkin • 14h ago

TIL whisker fatigue is a type of sensory overload in cats caused when their sensitive whiskers constantly brush against the sides of a deep or narrow food and water, and it can lead to cat acting tense or aggressive during mealtimes or pacing near the food bowl or acting hungry but refusing to eat.

petmd.com

3.6k Upvotes

83 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Express-Ant6341 • 16h ago

TIL that Phobos, the larger moon of Mars, orbits so close to the planet that tidal forces are pulling it inward. It moves about six feet closer every hundred years and will eventually crash into the planet or break apart into a ring.

science.nasa.gov

3.4k Upvotes

119 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sanguinusshiboleth • 43m ago

TIL of the Mount of Temptation, the mountain that Jesus was supposedly shown the whole world by Satan to tempt him after fasting for 40 days, is also called Mount Quarantine (from the latin "quarranta" meaning 40 days).

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

59 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Pan_inside • 2h ago

TIL Thomas Edison’s 1876 electric pen made tiny perforations in paper to create reusable stencils for copying documents. In 1891, Samuel O’Reilly adapted the technology into the first officially patented electric tattoo machine.

blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk

240 Upvotes

5 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Dizzy-Cartoonist3011 • 7h ago

TIL that in the 1860s Canada its own variant of baseball. The "Canadian Game" had 11 field players per team who all got to bat during an inning instead of a 3 out rule, 2 innings instead of 9, 5 bases, and base runners were ruled out by throwing the ball directly at them while between bases.

protoball.org

484 Upvotes

87 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 20h ago

TIL about Greg Land, an artist who illustrated several comics for both DC and Marvel, who is notorious for doing much of his art by tracing from other people's work, including pornography.

en.wikipedia.org

5.3k Upvotes

531 comments

r/todayilearned • u/malcontentgay • 1h ago

TIL about sea silk, a rare golden fabric made from filaments secreted by pen shells. It's been around for millennia, and is still made at small scale by a few people in Sardinia.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

3 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Therealdarkviper • 19m ago

TIL that several crew members onboard the Challenger space shuttle survived the initial breakup. It is theorized that some were conscious until they hit the surface of the Atlantic Ocean.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

13 comments

r/todayilearned • u/nleachdev • 1d ago

TIL about "dead red" laws, which allow drivers and motorcyclists to proceed through a red light if the traffic signal fails to detect their vehicle.

en.wikipedia.org

21.9k Upvotes

952 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Important_Ad7676 • 9h ago

TIL that the city of Opa-locka, Florida, was completely modeled after the One Thousand and One Nights folktales. Founded in 1926, the entire town features streets named Ali Baba Avenue and Aladdin Boulevard

en.wikipedia.org

373 Upvotes

45 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Greene_Mr • 6h ago

TIL the 1998 film adaptation of Scott Smith's novel "A Simple Plan" went through five different directors, including Mike Nichols (with Nicholas Cage attached), Ben Stiller, and John Boorman (who cast the two leads), before finally being helmed by Sam Raimi.

en.wikipedia.org

183 Upvotes

32 comments

r/todayilearned • u/YappinZappin • 23h ago

TIL modern jet fighters are designed to be inherently unstable in flight - tactical Supermaneuvrability dictates aircraft have enhanced responsiveness. On the downside it means pilots are no longer flying the airplanes - most control actions are performed by an onboard computer.

en.wikipedia.org

4.3k Upvotes

354 comments

r/todayilearned • u/heyauden • 15h ago

TIL that in Taiwan, a government-issued shopping invoice can also be a lottery ticket, with prizes of up to NT$10 million (nearly $315,000).

abc.net.au

853 Upvotes

39 comments

r/todayilearned • u/HeavyMetalOverbite • 23h ago

TIL Henry Ford chartered a ship with which he launched an amateur mission to Europe in 1915. He invited prominent peace activists to join him, and hoped to create enough publicity to prompt the belligerent nations to mediate an end to World War I but the mission was widely mocked by the press.

en.wikipedia.org

3.7k Upvotes

133 comments

Subreddit

Posts

Wiki

Today I Learned (TIL)

r/todayilearned

You learn something new every day; what did you learn today? Submit interesting and specific facts about something that you just found out here.

Members Active

41.7m

Sidebar

New to reddit? Click here!

You learn something new every day; what did you learn today?
Submit interesting and specific facts that you just found out (not broad information you looked up, TodayILearned is not /r/wikipedia).

Posting rules

Submissions must be verifiable. Please link directly to a reliable source that supports every claim in your post title. Images alone do not count as valid references. Videos are fine so long as they come from reputable sources (e.g. BBC, Discovery, etc).
No personal opinions, anecdotes or subjective statements (e.g "TIL xyz is a great movie").
No recent sources. Any sources (blog, article, press release, video, etc.) with a publication date more recent than two months are not allowed.
No politics, soapboxing, or agenda based submissions. This includes (but is not limited to) submissions related to:
1. Recent political issues and politicians
2. Social and economic issues (including race/religion/gender)
3. Environmental issues
4. Police misconduct
No misleading claims. Posts that omit essential information, or present unrelated facts in a way that suggest a connection will be removed.
Rephrase your post title if the following are not met:
1. Titles must begin with "TIL ..."
2. Make them descriptive, concise and specific (e.g. not "TIL something interesting about bacon").
3. Titles must be able to stand on their own without requiring readers to click on a link. Starting your title with a why/what/who/where/how modifier should be unnecessary.
4. "TIL about ..." and other broad posts don't belong on TIL. Try /r/Wikipedia, etc. instead, or be more specific (and avoid the word "about").
5. "TIL how to ..." posts belong on /r/HowTo.
6. "TIL the definition of a word..." Word definitions/translations/origins are not appropriate here
No submissions related to the usage, existence or features of specific software/websites (e.g. "TIL you can click on widgets in WidgetMaker 1.22").
All NSFW links must be tagged (including comments).

Please see the wiki for more detailed explanations of the rules, as well as additional rules that may not be listed here

(Why we need rules)

Additional info

If your post does not appear in the new queue and you think it meets the above rules, please contact the moderators (include a link to your reddit.com post, not your story).
Please report spam, inaccurate or otherwise inappropriate posts by messaging the moderators, as this helps us remove them more promptly!
More information available on the TIL FAQ and wiki.

Frequent TILs Repost List

As of May 2026

This list was compiled from /r/todayilearned community suggestions by its members. If your TIL is found on this list, it will be removed. The titles have been abridged for the sake of brevity, however the context remains the same. This list is subject to change. The purpose is to keep content fresh on /r/todayilearned as requested by its members. If you are interested in reading about the TILs on this list use the search box feature and enter the keywords to pull up past TILs.

Etiquette

We ask that you please do the following:

avoid mobile versions of websites (e.g. m.wikipedia.org)
link to the appropriate heading when referencing an article (particularly on Wikipedia)
link to the appropriate start time when referencing videos (e.g. on YouTube)
add [PDF] or [NSFW] tags to your posts, as necessary.
Please avoid reposting TILs that have already made the front page in the past

Please also read the site-wide Reddiquette.

You are loved.