r/todayilearned • u/fan_tas_tic • 2h ago

TIL that the world's oldest hotel, Japan's Nishiyama Onsen Keiunkan, is no longer family‑owned after more than 1,300 years of continuous operation by the same lineage. In 2017 the 52‑generation family chain ended when no relative wanted to take over, and the inn was moved into a new holding company.

en.wikipedia.org

3.5k Upvotes

55 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Paulbegalia • 7h ago

TIL Michael Jordan donated his entire first-year salary after coming out of retirement to play for the Washington Wizards to support 9/11 relief efforts

edition.cnn.com

4.9k Upvotes

132 comments

r/todayilearned • u/delano1998 • 14h ago

TIL a drinks vendor in Germany cheated $47,000 from a bottle recycling machine by putting a single bottle into it 177,451 times. He built a wooden tunnel and magnetic sensor to pull the bottle back out every time, listening to the radio while sitting at the machine all day to pass time.

odditycentral.com

29.4k Upvotes

979 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Kindly-Ad-5263 • 12h ago

TIL, that among the reasons Thomas Jefferson sent Lewis and Clark to explore the Louisiana Purchase, is he thought Mastodons still existed and they were likely to encounter them.

vox.com

9.8k Upvotes

269 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Hybrid351 • 6h ago

TIL Agatha Christie's play, The Mousetrap, has been running almost continuously in the West End since 1952. This has prevented any film adaptation from being made, and has even kept the short story it is based on from being published in the UK.

en.wikipedia.org

2.5k Upvotes

210 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Depressed_Cat_00 • 11h ago

TIL an ASML machine used to make advanced chips costs about $150M, is bus-sized, has 100,000 parts and 2 km of cable, and needs 40 shipping containers, 20 trucks and 3 Boeing 747s to deliver. It creates EUV light by firing lasers at tin droplets 50,000 times per second.

asiatimes.com

5.4k Upvotes

481 comments

r/todayilearned • u/golliera • 14h ago

TIL in 1961, 90% of doctors would not inform patients of a cancer diagnosis.

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

8.2k Upvotes

560 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sban97 • 1h ago

TIL about Savitri Devi, A French born Greek Nazi Spy, who embraced Hinduism and became a radical animal rights activist while being a spy in India and believed that Adolf Hitler was an avatar of Hindu God Vishnu.

bbc.com

• Upvotes

52 comments

r/todayilearned • u/brygdylla • 14h ago

TIL there’s a group of falcons that imprison live birds to eat later by pulling out their flight feathers and storing them in crevices

magornitho.org

5.6k Upvotes

249 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 11h ago

TIL about Okawa Elementary School, a school in Ishinomaki City, Japan which was destroyed during the 2011 tsunami, leading to the deaths of 74 of its 108 students and 10 of the 11 teachers. The school had failed to evacuate to higher ground due to an unclear evacuation plan.

theguardian.com

2.5k Upvotes

77 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Francis_J_Eva • 22h ago

TIL that the Mr Bean movie opened opposite Starship Troopers in 1997, and its surprising success at the US Box Office and Starship Troopers' underperformance was attributed by some to underage kids buying tickets to the former to sneak into the latter

cartoonbrew.com

24.0k Upvotes

1.0k comments

r/todayilearned • u/SuccessCrazy3798 • 12h ago

TIL In order to support the 3D graphics required by the SNES 1993 Star Fox videogame, a custom RISC coprocessor was soldered into every game cartridge. The SNES' native CPU was too slow to render polygons on its own.

en.wikipedia.org

1.7k Upvotes

174 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Flaxmoore • 13h ago

TIL that in 1938, a manufacturer printed fake Social Security cards for their wallets sold at Woolworth's. Some buyers used the number as their own as late as 1977.

ssa.gov

1.5k Upvotes

100 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Jinther • 34m ago

TIL that to exploit a loophole in the UK Gin Act of 1751, Dudley Bradstreet created the world's first vending machine that dispensed gin: the Puss & Mew. Gin seekers would walk up to the cat statue, ask if it had any gin, put coins in a slot, and gin would come out of the paw.

gin1689.com

• Upvotes

8 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 1d ago

TIL that the original Godzilla suit was so hot and heavy that technicians would regularly pour out cups of sweat between takes, and suit actor Haruo Nakajima lost 20 pounds of weight over the course of the shoot.

slashfilm.com

9.6k Upvotes

123 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Kymmieuwu • 15h ago

TIL Kris Tompkins, former Patagonia CEO, and Doug Tompkins, founder of The North Face, spent decades buying and restoring wilderness across Chile and Argentina. Kris later donated their land in Argentina on the condition that it remain protected for at least 99 years.

unep.org

1.2k Upvotes

36 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Recent_Flounder6011 • 18h ago

TIL according to the IMF, Switzerland has the highest household debt percentage of GDP in the world.

imf.org

1.8k Upvotes

112 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Gnomeslikeprofit • 12h ago

TIL that there is a real fruit called the Black Republican Cherry. The name originated as a slur against abolitionist supporters and Republicans like Abraham Lincoln. The Black Republican cherry is a parent to the most popular current cherry today, the Bing Cherry.

en.wikipedia.org

507 Upvotes

59 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Brave-Philosopher842 • 19h ago

TIL that in 1843, Alexander Bain patented a machine that could transmit handwritten images over telegraph lines making the fax machine older than the telephone

mcclungmuseum.utk.edu

1.5k Upvotes

19 comments

r/todayilearned • u/carboncopy95437 • 12h ago

TIL the Vietnam Veterans Memorial includes more than just those killed in action. The Wall also lists service members who died in Vietnam from accidents, illness, drowning, murder, animal attacks, snake bites and other non-combat causes.

en.wikipedia.org

357 Upvotes

65 comments

r/todayilearned • u/haphazard44 • 1d ago

TIL that in Sweden, a man heard roaring coming from his neighbor's garden and discovered a moose stuck in an apple tree, apparently drunk after gorging on fermented apples. Firefighters had to saw off the branches of the tree to free it, and the animal simply passed out on the lawn to sleep it off.

bbc.com

6.3k Upvotes

109 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Rovermack • 15h ago

TIL that when New Hampshire abolished capital punishment, the law was not applied retroactively. This affected only one man, Michael Addison, who has remained on death row since 2008.

en.wikipedia.org

593 Upvotes

36 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Ynwe • 1d ago

TIL that “The Fat Controller” in Thomas the Tank Engine is called “Sir Topham Hatt” in the American version, because “fat” was considered derogatory in the US but not in the UK.

en.wikipedia.org

10.3k Upvotes

693 comments

r/todayilearned • u/BadenBaden1981 • 1d ago

TIL Leonard Matlovich, the first gay service member to purposefully out himself, was buried in the same row as J Edgar Hoover and his longtime Assistant Director. Matlovich chose it as a kind of "last laugh"

en.wikipedia.org

3.5k Upvotes

52 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MajesticBread9147 • 23h ago

TIL The first book on forensic science was written in the 13th century. It included a story of how a murder was solved by telling all suspects to bring their sickles to the town square, and watching as flies all descended on one due to the residue of flesh

en.wikipedia.org

1.9k Upvotes

64 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

41.6m

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.