What is Bill Gates’ IQ?
A reported 1590 SAT and a teacher’s recollection, but no IQ test on record.
No IQ test result has ever been published for Bill Gates. The 160 in circulation has two traceable roots, a fourth-grade teacher’s recollection in a 1993 biography and conversions of a reported 1590 on the pre-1995 SAT, so this page rates him at 150–160 as a band, not a reading.
Bill Gates’ estimated IQ
- Reported 1590 out of 1600 on the SAT before the 1995 recentering. A Week magazine article on the redesigned SAT lists it beside Paul Allen’s 1600, “based on their own recollections or press inquiries”; no score report has been published.
- Frey and Detterman (2004) found the SAT correlated .82 with a general-ability factor from the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery in a national sample of 917 people, and .483 (.72 corrected for restricted range) with Raven’s matrices in 104 undergraduates.
- Named a National Merit Scholar in 1973 by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation, whose competition starts from the PSAT/NMSQT; entered Harvard that fall and left in 1975 without a degree.
- Solved a combinatorics problem as a Harvard sophomore, published with Christos Papadimitriou in 1979 and the best known solution for about 30 years: evidence of mathematical ability, not a measure of IQ.
A converted SAT score is still not an IQ test. In Frey and Detterman’s two samples the SAT correlated .82 and .483 with their ability measures; a single score pulls any estimate back toward the average; the equation they print for pre-1995 scores was fitted on a sample averaging 854 and cannot be run out to 1590; and a near-ceiling score cannot separate a 1590 from a 1600. A band, not a point, is the most this score can give.
- Born
- October 28, 1955, Seattle
- Field
- Software, global health philanthropy
- Education
- Lakeside School, class of 1973; Harvard College, 1973–75, left without a degree; honorary Doctor of Laws, Harvard, 2007
- IQ test result
- None published
- SAT
- 1590 of 1600 (pre-1995 scale), as reported
- National Merit
- Scholar, class of 1973
- Known for
- Microsoft, Gates Foundation
- Nationality
- American
What an IQ of 150–160 actually means
Set the claim aside for a moment. If someone genuinely scored in this range, here is what that would represent.
Average is 100 by construction, and about two-thirds of people fall between 85 and 115. Take the test to place your own score on this scale.
| Score range | Classification | Share of people | What it indicates |
|---|---|---|---|
| 85 – 114 | Average | ~68% | The range most people fall into. |
| 115 – 129 | Above average | ~13.6% | Roughly one person in seven. |
| 130 – 144 | Gifted | ~2% | The threshold most high-IQ societies use. |
| Above 144 | Highly gifted | ~0.1% | Figures above this range are extrapolated from the curve rather than measured. |
Percentages are approximate and describe a normal distribution. The same number means different things on tests with different standard deviations.
Thirty questions gives you a measured position on this exact scale — your score, your percentile and the ability breakdown behind it.
Find out in 30 minutes →Who Bill Gates is
Bill Gates entered Lakeside School in Seattle in 1968, in eighth grade, the year its Mothers’ Club bought a terminal that let students reach a remote computer, and graduated with the class of 1973 as a National Merit Scholar. He entered Harvard that fall, left in 1975 without a degree, and co-founded Microsoft with Paul Allen, who had graduated from Lakeside two years ahead of him. He stepped back from the company in stages from 2000 and has since worked primarily through the Gates Foundation.
His Harvard record is documented in his own words and in the 1993 biography. In Source Code (2025) he describes the freshman Math 55 course, writes that he earned a B+ in the first semester, and concludes that he had “talent but not the ability to make fundamental discoveries.” A C in organic chemistry was the lowest grade he received at Harvard. As a sophomore he solved a pancake-sorting problem posed in Harry Lewis’s combinatorics class with an algorithm that needed five-thirds as many flips as there are pancakes; with Christos Papadimitriou he published it in Discrete Mathematics in 1979, and it stood as the best known solution for about 30 years. Harvard gave him an honorary Doctor of Laws on June 7, 2007.
The same flat 160 circulates for Steve Jobs and Warren Buffett. Here the Jobs and Elon Musk ratings (150–160 and 140–150) rest on achievement alone, and the Buffett and Mark Zuckerberg ratings (145–160 and 135–145) on achievement and academic record. For the wider Harvard picture, see average IQ of Harvard students, and for the 160 line itself, what an IQ of 160 means.
By Elora Mercer, Celebrity Research WriterFigures checked by Leon Falkner, Data & Research AnalystReviewed by Aarav Vardhan, Editor-in-Chief · Last reviewed October 2026
Bill Gates: the documented record
The estimate above rests on this record. Every entry here is a matter of public fact, which is more than can be said for the number itself.
- 1968Enters Lakeside School in eighth grade; a school terminal gives students a link to a remote computer.
- 1973Graduates Lakeside as a National Merit Scholar; enters Harvard.
- 1975Leaves Harvard; Microsoft is founded with Paul Allen.
- 1979Publishes “Bounds for sorting by prefix reversal” with Christos Papadimitriou in Discrete Mathematics.
- 1981IBM introduces its personal computer with Microsoft’s MS-DOS.
- 1986Microsoft goes public.
- 2000Steps down as CEO; the Gates Foundation is established.
- 2007Receives an honorary Doctor of Laws from Harvard on June 7.
- 2008Leaves day-to-day work at Microsoft for the foundation.
- 2020Leaves the Microsoft board.
- 2025Publishes Source Code, a memoir of his early years through the founding of Microsoft.
Where the 160 figure came from
Following a claim back to its first appearance is the part almost nobody does — and it is what most people are actually asking.
The oldest IQ figure traced for Bill Gates is not a test score. The 1993 biography Gates, by Stephen Manes and Paul Andrews, excerpted in The Seattle Times on January 10, 1993, quotes his fourth-grade teacher at View Ridge Elementary, Hazel Carlson, saying his IQ, “which she estimated in the 160s or 170s,” was among the higher ones she had come across. That is a teacher’s impression, not an administered test. Pages that explain today’s 160 describe a different route: Riot IQ (July 2026) calls it “not a measurement” and a derivation from the SAT, and Life Score Test (September 2026) calls it an extrapolation from the reported 1590.
The SAT score has a thinner trail than its reputation suggests. The 1590 appears in print by 2006 in The Week, in a list of well-known Americans’ SATs “based on their own recollections or press inquiries,” with Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen at 1600. No score report has been published, and the 1993 excerpt that carries the teacher’s estimate does not mention the SAT. That is why it supports a high estimate and cannot produce a precise one.
The conversion has a real literature behind it. Frey and Detterman (2004), in Psychological Science, found the SAT correlated .82 with a general-ability factor in a national sample of 917 people, but only .483 (.72 after correcting for restricted range) with Raven’s matrices among 104 undergraduates taking the recentered test. Neither study was built for a score at the ceiling. The equation they print for pre-1995 scores was fitted on a sample that averaged 854 and cannot be run out to 1590. Any honest conversion of one near-perfect score is a band, and the sites publishing “160” as a plain fact have skipped every one of those qualifications. For the general case, see SAT score to IQ conversion and the IQ ceiling effect.
How we read a number →Study 1: National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979, 917 participants, r = .82. Study 2: 104 undergraduates, recentered SAT and Raven’s matrices, r = .483 (.72 corrected). Prints the equation for pre-1995 scores that turns downward above about 1,340. Cited for method, not for a figure about Gates.
Source of the oldest IQ figure traced (a fourth-grade teacher’s estimate), the 1968 Lakeside entry and the C in organic chemistry. The excerpt does not mention the SAT.
Prints Gates at 1590 and Paul Allen at 1600 in a list “based on their own recollections or press inquiries.” The earliest printed source for the 1590 traced to date; a list of recollections, not a score report.
Lists William H. “Bill” Gates III among 1973 National Merit Scholarship recipients.
Confirm the honorary Doctor of Laws at Harvard’s 356th Commencement, that Gates dropped out of the College in 1975.
The paper’s publication record is confirmed in Crossref. In the NPR report Harvard’s Harry Lewis recalls posing the problem in class and a sophomore Gates returning with a five-thirds-N algorithm, and says the problem stayed in that state for 30 years.
A Columbia mathematician quotes Gates’s memoir Source Code (2025) on the freshman Math 55 course: the B+ in the first semester and “talent but not the ability to make fundamental discoveries.” Second-hand quotation; passages are given as he prints them.
1975 founding; August 12, 1981, IBM introduces its personal computer with MS-DOS 1.0; March 13, 1986, stock goes public; June 27, 2008, Gates moves from his day-to-day role.
The Mothers’ Club bought the school’s first terminal in 1968; Gates is listed as class of ’73 and Paul Allen as ’71.
Two current pages that describe the circulating 160 as a derivation from the SAT score. Life Score Test adds that it has not seen a primary document for the 1590.
No IQ test result for Gates has been published, and no SAT score report is available. The SAT figure is a reported number and is presented as a proxy, not as a measurement.
The sources behind our estimate
The figures that circulate for Bill Gates, what we were able to confirm, and where the two diverge.
The figure repeated across IQ lists, usually as a flat fact. Where a source can be traced it is a fourth-grade teacher’s recollection in a 1993 biography or a conversion of the reported SAT score; no IQ test result sits behind it.
A reported test score, on a test that is not an IQ test. Gates is credited with 1590 of a possible 1600 on the SAT before the 1995 recentering, a figure printed by 2006 in a Week magazine list based on “their own recollections or press inquiries.” Frey and Detterman (2004) showed SAT performance tracks general cognitive ability closely enough to make a conversion arguable, but no score report has been published, so the input is well reported rather than primary.
A flat 160 and an SAT-derived band circulate side by side. The band is the more honest of the two, because it admits the conversion is a range rather than a reading.
Want a number that does hold up? Every figure on this page is somebody’s claim. Take the 30-question test and get a percentile you can check rather than a figure you have to trust.
Bill Gates — frequently asked
What is Bill Gates’s IQ?
No IQ test result has ever been published for Bill Gates. This page rates his IQ at 150–160, a band read from a reported 1590 out of 1600 on the pre-1995 SAT, and a converted SAT score carries far wider error than a measured one. The flat 160 in circulation is an estimate, not a score.
What did Bill Gates get on the SAT?
He is reported to have scored 1590 out of 1600 on the SAT before entering Harvard in 1973. The figure appears in print by 2006, in a Week magazine list of well-known Americans’ SATs “based on their own recollections or press inquiries,” next to Paul Allen’s 1600. No score report has been published, so it is well reported rather than primary.
Where does Bill Gates’s 160 IQ come from?
No IQ test sits behind it. The oldest figure traced is his fourth-grade teacher Hazel Carlson’s recollection that his IQ ran “in the 160s or 170s,” printed in the 1993 biography Gates by Stephen Manes and Paul Andrews. Current pages such as Riot IQ and Life Score Test instead call 160 an extrapolation from the reported 1590 SAT.
How smart is Bill Gates? Is he a genius?
The documented record shows a very strong student, and “genius” is a label rather than a test band. He was a 1973 National Merit Scholar, solved a combinatorics problem as a Harvard sophomore (published in Discrete Mathematics, 1979), and wrote in his 2025 memoir that he earned a B+ in his first semester of Math 55. For what a score near 150 would mean, see what an IQ of 150 means.
Did Bill Gates ever take an IQ test?
No IQ test result is on record. The standardized tests attached to his name are the SAT (reported 1590 of 1600) and the PSAT/NMSQT, the qualifying test for the National Merit program, which lists him as a 1973 National Merit Scholar. Neither is an IQ test, and neither score report has been published.
Does a high SAT score prove a high IQ?
It supports an inference, not a conclusion. Frey and Detterman (2004) found the SAT correlated .82 with a general-ability measure in one sample of 917 and .483 (.72 after correcting for restricted range) with Raven’s matrices in another of 104 undergraduates, so any single score converts to a band with real error. For the general picture, see SAT score to IQ conversion.
Who has the higher IQ: Bill Gates, Steve Jobs or Elon Musk?
On this site Gates is rated 150–160, Steve Jobs 150–160 and Elon Musk 140–150. The ranges overlap, and the evidence differs: Gates’s band is read from a reported SAT score, while the Jobs and Musk ratings rest on achievement alone. None of the three ratings is a test result, so none supports calling one higher than another.
Did Bill Gates finish his degree?
No. He entered Harvard in the fall of 1973, left in 1975 to build Microsoft, and never returned to complete a bachelor’s degree. Harvard awarded him an honorary Doctor of Laws at its 356th Commencement on June 7, 2007, where he spoke to the graduating class.
How does my IQ compare with Bill Gates?
You can find out in about fifteen minutes. The IQ Metrics assessment is 30 questions, scored on the same 100-mean scale used throughout this page, so your result and the estimate above are at least expressed in the same units — one measured, one inferred. Once you have a number, the leaderboard shows where it would sit, and how we score and norm it explains the benchmarking.
Where does this estimate come from?
From the documented record rather than a test — the method is named above and set out in full under how we read a number. Compare it against the other business & tech profiles, starting with Steve Jobs.
- Take the 30-question IQ test — get a measured score and percentile of your own
- Average IQ by country — how the scale behaves across populations
- How IQ Metrics scores its assessment — the method behind our own number
- More on how IQ testing works — reliability, error and what a score can and cannot say
- More business & tech profiles — same field, same method
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