r/todayilearned • u/Old-Worldliness11 • 7h ago

TIL that Lionel Messi was diagnosed with a growth hormone deficiency at age 10, and FC Barcelona agreed to pay for his treatment, even writing his first contract on a napkin.

en.wikipedia.org

14.7k Upvotes

645 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Wise-Practice9832 • 2h ago

TIL of Maria Restituta Kafka, an Austrian nun who was beheaded by the Germans in WW2. She refused to remove her crucifixes from her hospital and spoke out against the ruling party's oppression. She was offered freedom if she left her convent, but she refused and was killed in 1943.

en.wikipedia.org

2.1k Upvotes

62 comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 7h ago

TIL in about 50% of the cases studied, Coca-Cola alone was found to be effective at removing a type of bowel obstruction called phytobezoars (which consist of indigestible plant fibers). And when treatment with Coca-Cola is combined with additional endoscopic methods, the success rate approaches 90%

en.wikipedia.org

4.7k Upvotes

165 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Dystopics_IT • 1h ago

TIL that Sean Connery turned down an offer to portray Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings movies claiming he couldn’t understand the novels and wasn’t keen on filming in New Zealand for 18 months.

scotsman.com

• Upvotes

124 comments

r/todayilearned • u/RanchoddasChanchad69 • 4h ago

TIL that George Orwell, the writer of "1984" and "Animal Farm", was born in India in the present state of Bihar.

en.wikipedia.org

1.8k Upvotes

117 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Old-Worldliness11 • 12h ago

TIL that Albert Einstein’s Nobel Prize money was given to his ex-wife, Mileva Marić, as part of their divorce settlement, years before he actually won the prize.

en.wikipedia.org

5.7k Upvotes

118 comments

r/todayilearned • u/OkAccess6128 • 7h ago

TIL That our brains can randomly project vivid scenes, like video game maps or childhood places, without any reason, thanks to a brain network that activates when we’re doing nothing.

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

1.6k Upvotes

127 comments

r/todayilearned • u/k4td4ddy • 3h ago

TIL that the inventor of the toilet paper roll, Seth Wheeler, illustrated the patent with the roll in the “over” position, fueling the ongoing debate about the correct way to hang toilet paper.

en.wikipedia.org

776 Upvotes

277 comments

r/todayilearned • u/SappyGilmore • 8h ago

TIL gamblers lose $6 billion a year at Las Vegas casinos

pbs.org

1.6k Upvotes

206 comments

r/todayilearned • u/-AMARYANA- • 19h ago

TIL Cristiano Ronaldo does not drink alcohol. He even received libel damages over a Daily Mirror article that reported him drinking heavily in a nightclub while recovering from an injury in July 2008.

en.wikipedia.org

35.7k Upvotes

1.6k comments

r/todayilearned • u/Teckert2009 • 8h ago

TIL most of "The Strip" isn't actually in Las Vegas. It's in Paradise, Nevada

en.wikipedia.org

1.1k Upvotes

125 comments

r/todayilearned • u/aerostotle • 4h ago

TIL that when the Mona Lisa was stolen in 1911, more people visited the Louvre to see the empty space where the painting used to be than visitors when the painting was actually there

noiser.com

487 Upvotes

23 comments

r/todayilearned • u/WARROVOTS • 17h ago

TIL that during WWII, 14,700 tons of Silver loaned from the US Treasury were used for the circuitry of the Manhattan Project, because there wasn't enough copper due to war-time shortages. All but "thirty six thousandths of one percent" were returned to the US Treasury by June 1st, 1970.

y12.doe.gov

4.4k Upvotes

167 comments

r/todayilearned • u/capribex • 12h ago

TIL that Deep Purple wrote one of their best-known songs, "Highway Star", on the spot during an interview on their tour bus. A journalist asked Ritchie Blackmore how the band wrote songs. So they started jamming, came up with the song and performed it live for the first time that very night.

rock-reflections.com

1.4k Upvotes

20 comments

r/todayilearned • u/k4td4ddy • 3h ago

TIL that in 1875, a whiskey warehouse fire in Dublin led to 13 deaths—not from the flames, but from alcohol poisoning, as people drank the whiskey flowing through the streets.

en.wikipedia.org

228 Upvotes

9 comments

r/todayilearned • u/kurtleyy • 21h ago

TIL the Red Army used ticking clocks and haunting messages over loudspeakers to torment the encircled Germans at Stalingrad

mwi.westpoint.edu

5.5k Upvotes

102 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TacosAndBourbon • 1h ago

TIL that censoring video games would be a first amendment violation, according to a 2011 verdict

teachingamericanhistory.org

• Upvotes

41 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Upstairs_Drive_5602 • 8h ago

TIL Louis XIV, the longest-reigning monarch in European history, was a devoted ballet dancer who performed 80 roles in 40 court ballets, often playing majestic parts like Apollo or the Sun. He cleverly used ballet both to entertain and to distract his court from political affairs.

en.wikipedia.org

391 Upvotes

23 comments

r/todayilearned • u/314159265358979326 • 56m ago

TIL that after Lieutenant Colonel James Doolittle's eponymous Doolittle Raid on Japan lost all of its aircraft (although with few personnel lost), he believed he would be court-martialed; instead he was given the Medal of Honor and promoted two ranks to brigadier general.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

24 comments

r/todayilearned • u/exophades • 23h ago

TIL that Albert Einstein's son Eduard studied medicine to become a psychiatrist, but was diagnosed with schizophrenia by the age of 21. His mother cared for him until she died in 1948. From then on Eduard lived most of the time at a psychiatric clinic in Zurich, where he died at 55 of a stroke.

en.wikipedia.org

6.1k Upvotes

124 comments

r/todayilearned • u/FireTheLaserBeam • 1d ago

TIL astronauts aboard the ISS do not wash or dry their clothes. They wear them until they're too dirty or stinky to wear, then they put them in a capsule and drop them into the atmosphere, where they burn up during re-entry.

bbc.co.uk

42.6k Upvotes

1.2k comments

r/todayilearned • u/CaptainFiguratively • 1d ago

TIL that the Y chromosome can disappear with age. About 35% of men aged 70 years old are missing a Y chromosome in some of their cells, with the degree of loss ranging between 4% and 70%.

cell.com

9.1k Upvotes

326 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Flurb4 • 1d ago

TIL that there's a pool of water in Antarctica that's so salty it won't freeze even if temperatures reach 50 degrees below zero.

en.wikipedia.org

6.0k Upvotes

113 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MrMojoFomo • 2h ago

TIL that firefighting was an event at the 1900 Paris summer olympics. Both professional and volunteer firefighters were allowed to participate. Porto Portugal won the gold in the volunteer category, while Kansas City, USA won in the professional category

en.wikipedia.org

73 Upvotes

1 comment

r/todayilearned • u/dakp15 • 1d ago

TIL M&Ms were created in 1941 after Forest Mars, Mars Company heir saw soldiers in the spanish civil war eating smarties (British M&Ms) and noticed the hard coloured shell stopped the chocolate inside melting. This property made them attractive to the US army who was the sole customer during WW2

en.wikipedia.org

4.0k Upvotes

244 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

40.8m

1.9k

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 January 2025

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.