Comparison

Albert Einstein vs Isaac Newton — Compared

Two physicists who remade our picture of the universe, side by side — drawn only from their published biographies.

How to read this comparison: it is contextual, not a contest. There are no scores and no universal winner — the table sets out what each person did, so you can judge the differences for yourself. Every fact comes from the two published biographies linked below; where a field is not documented for a person, the table says so rather than guessing.

Albert Einstein during a lecture in Vienna in 1921

Albert Einstein Theoretical physicist · 1879–1955 Scientists & Inventors

Portrait of Sir Isaac Newton, painted by Sir Godfrey Kneller in 1689

Isaac Newton Mathematician and physicist · 1643–1727 Scientists & Inventors

Topic	Albert Einstein	Isaac Newton
Profession	Theoretical physicist	Mathematician and physicist
Nationality	German-born Swiss-American	English
Born	14 March 1879 in Ulm, Kingdom of Württemberg, German Empire (now Germany)	4 January 1643 in Woolsthorpe-by-Colsterworth, Lincolnshire, England
Died	18 April 1955 in Princeton, New Jersey, United States	31 March 1727 in Kensington, London, England
Milestones	1879 — Born on 14 March in Ulm, Kingdom of Württemberg, German Empire 1896 — Enrolled at the Swiss Federal Polytechnic School in Zurich; renounced German citizenship 1900 — Graduated from the Swiss Federal Polytechnic with a teaching diploma 1901 — Became a Swiss citizen 1902 — Began work as a technical examiner at the Swiss Patent Office in Bern 1905 — Annus mirabilis: four landmark papers in Annalen der Physik; doctorate from the University of Zurich 1909 — Left the patent office for a professorship at the University of Zurich 1914 — Moved to Berlin as a member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences 1915 — Presented the field equations of general relativity 1919 — Solar eclipse expeditions confirmed the bending of starlight predicted by general relativity 1922 — Awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics for the photoelectric effect (presented in 1922) 1933 — Left Germany and joined the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton 1939 — Signed the letter to President Roosevelt warning of a possible German atomic bomb programme 1940 — Became a citizen of the United States, retaining Swiss citizenship 1955 — Died in Princeton, New Jersey, aged 76	1643 — Born at Woolsthorpe Manor, Lincolnshire (4 January 1643 New Style; 25 December 1642 Old Style) 1661 — Admitted to Trinity College, Cambridge, as a subsizar 1665 — Took his bachelor's degree; the plague years at Woolsthorpe began his work on calculus, optics and gravitation 1667 — Elected a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge 1669 — Succeeded Isaac Barrow as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics 1672 — Elected a fellow of the Royal Society after demonstrating his reflecting telescope 1687 — The Principia was published, setting out the laws of motion and universal gravitation 1689 — Served as Member of Parliament for Cambridge University (1689–90) 1696 — Moved to London as Warden of the Royal Mint 1699 — Became Master of the Royal Mint 1703 — Elected president of the Royal Society 1704 — Published Opticks 1705 — Knighted by Queen Anne, the first scientist to be knighted for scientific work 1727 — Died in Kensington, London, aged 84; buried in Westminster Abbey
Achievements	Published four landmark papers in 1905 — his annus mirabilis — on the photoelectric effect, Brownian motion, special relativity and mass-energy equivalence Formulated the special theory of relativity (1905) and the general theory of relativity (1915), describing gravity as the curvature of spacetime Awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics for his explanation of the photoelectric effect (prize presented in 1922) Predicted the bending of starlight by gravity, confirmed by the solar eclipse expeditions of 29 May 1919, which made him world-famous Co-authored the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paper (1935), which framed the debate over quantum entanglement Signed the 1939 letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt warning that Germany might be developing an atomic bomb Named Time magazine's Person of the Century in 1999	Formulated the three laws of motion and the law of universal gravitation in Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (1687), founding classical mechanics Co-invented calculus, independently of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, developing the method of fluxions Showed with prisms that white light is composed of the colours of the spectrum, founding the science of optics Built the first practical reflecting telescope in 1668 Served as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge from 1669 to 1702 Served as Warden (1696–1699) and then Master (1699–1727) of the Royal Mint, overseeing the recoinage of England President of the Royal Society from 1703 until his death in 1727 Knighted by Queen Anne in 1705, the first scientist to be knighted for scientific work
Known works	On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies (1905) Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon Its Energy Content? (1905) The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity (1916) Relativity: The Special and the General Theory (1916) The Meaning of Relativity (1922) The Evolution of Physics (1938, with Leopold Infeld)	Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (1687) Opticks (1704) Arithmetica Universalis (1707) De analysi per aequationes numero terminorum infinitas (written 1669, published 1711)
Contributions	Einstein's work joined three strands of physics that had seemed separate: light, motion and gravity. Special relativity showed that space and time are not absolute but depend on the observer's motion, and that mass and energy are equivalent. General relativity went further, describing gravity not as a force acting at a distance, as Newton had conceived it, but as the curvature of spacetime caused by mass and energy — a prediction confirmed by the bending of starlight in 1919 and, a century later, by the direct detection of gravitational waves. His 1905 paper on light quanta, for which he won the Nobel Prize, treated light as discrete packets of energy and laid a foundation of quantum theory, even though he remained uneasy about the theory's probabilistic interpretation for the rest of his life.	Newton's contribution was to make physics mathematical. Before the Principia, the motion of the heavens and the motion of objects on Earth were treated as different subjects; Newton's laws of motion and universal gravitation joined them, showing that one inverse-square law governs a falling apple and the orbit of the Moon. In mathematics he developed the method of fluxions — his version of calculus — which gave scientists the tools to describe change and motion. In optics he showed that white light is a mixture of colours and built the reflecting telescope, which replaced the refracting telescope for serious astronomy. As president of the Royal Society and Master of the Mint he also shaped the institutions of British science and public life for a generation.
Timeline	14 March 1879 — Born in Ulm, Kingdom of Württemberg, German Empire 1896 — Enrolled at the Swiss Federal Polytechnic School in Zurich; renounced German citizenship 1900 — Graduated from the Swiss Federal Polytechnic with a teaching diploma in mathematics and physics 1901 — Became a Swiss citizen 1902 — Began work as a technical examiner at the Swiss Patent Office in Bern 1903 — Married Mileva Marić, a fellow physics student from Zurich 1905 — Annus mirabilis: published four landmark papers in Annalen der Physik and received his doctorate from the University of Zurich 1909 — Left the patent office to become associate professor at the University of Zurich 1914 — Moved to Berlin as a member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences 25 November 1915 — Presented the final form of the field equations of general relativity to the Prussian Academy of Sciences 29 May 1919 — Solar eclipse expeditions confirmed the bending of starlight predicted by general relativity 1922 — Awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics for the photoelectric effect (prize presented in 1922) 1933-10 — Joined the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, after leaving Germany 2 August 1939 — Signed the letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt warning that Germany might be pursuing an atomic bomb 1940 — Became a citizen of the United States, retaining Swiss citizenship 18 April 1955 — Died in Princeton, New Jersey, aged 76, of an abdominal aortic aneurysm	4 January 1643 — Born at Woolsthorpe Manor, Lincolnshire (25 December 1642 Old Style, on the Julian calendar then used in England) 1661-06 — Admitted to Trinity College, Cambridge, as a subsizar 1665 — Took his bachelor's degree; plague closed Cambridge and he returned to Woolsthorpe, beginning work on calculus, optics and gravitation 1667 — Elected a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge 1669 — Succeeded Isaac Barrow as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics 1672 — Elected a fellow of the Royal Society after demonstrating his reflecting telescope; published his paper on light and colours 5 July 1687 — The Principia was published, setting out the laws of motion and universal gravitation 1696 — Moved to London as Warden of the Royal Mint 1699 — Became Master of the Royal Mint 1703 — Elected president of the Royal Society, a post he held until his death 1704 — Published Opticks, his collected work on light and colour 1705-04 — Knighted by Queen Anne at Trinity College, Cambridge 31 March 1727 — Died in Kensington, London, aged 84 (20 March 1726 Old Style); buried in Westminster Abbey

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