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Known affectionately as Silent Cal, the 30th president had an IQ of 127.1. Revered for his belief in equal rights, but also blamed by some for setting the stage for the Great Depression, Coolidge graduated from Amherst College in Massachusetts with honors.
Ronald Reagan, the 40th president of the United States, had an IQ score of 130. Despite his intelligence, Reagan wasn't particularly interested in school, and graduated from college with a C average. Afterwards, Reagan pursued careers in radio and film before being drawn to politics.
Lyndon B. Johnson, who became the 36th president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, had an IQ of 127.83 and was passionately studious all his life. After being elected president of his 11th grade class, Johnson studied at what is now Texas State University and graduated with a teaching certificate and a bachelor's degree in history.
Gerald Ford, the 38th president of the United States, had an IQ of 127.08. Not only did he study at and graduate from Yale Law School, but he did so while coaching the Yale varsity football team.
Herbert Hoover, while not particularly popular as the 31st president during the Great Depression, had been successful and industrious from a young age. Hoover, who had an IQ of 129.78, while studying geology at Stanford, created his own business on the side taking care of fellow students' laundry.
Although he had an IQ of 127.55, Harry Truman, the 33rd president of the United States, never received a college degree. Truman was, in fact, blind in one eye, which made it difficult for him to follow along, and he dropped out of college after just a year.
The 25th and 41st presidents both had an IQ score of exactly 130.13, but their educations couldn't have been more different. McKinley only attended one year of college and chose instead to fight in the Civil War for the Union, while Bush graduated Phi Betta Kappa from Yale University in two and a half years, while also serving as president of his fraternity and captain of the baseball team.
Grover Cleveland, the 22nd and 24th president of the United States, was the only president in history to serve two non-consecutive terms. He was also one of the few presidents to not go to college, due to financial limitations in his case. However, thanks to his 130.95 IQ, Cleveland became sufficiently self-taught in law, enough to pass the bar exam without any professional tutelage.
Benjamin Harrison, the 23rd president of the United States, while not a very well-remembered leader, was one of the smartest, with an IQ score of 132.15. Although criticized for his widespread federal funding, Harrison was ahead of his time as a leader for trying (unsuccessfully) to enforce African-American voting rights at the end of the 19th century.
Despite having an impressive IQ score of 131.9, Dwight D. Eisenhower was known to be particularly disinterested in education in his youth. During his time at West Point Military Academy, the future 34th president was a below-average student with more than a few disciplinary infractions.
James K. Polk, the United States' 11th president, had an IQ of 130.2 and seemed to put every point of it to use. Considered one of the most effective presidents in US history, Polk made good on all of his campaign promises and pushed the border of the United States all the way to the Pacific Ocean.
While not frequently remembered in modern times, Martin Van Buren is distinguished from all other presidents as being the only to have learned English as a second language, and was also the first in history to not come from an English background. The eighth president, who had an IQ of 133.35, came from a poor Dutch family in New York.
Long before the Watergate scandal destroyed any chance he had at leaving behind a positive legacy, 37th President Richard Nixon had been a near-perfect student. Despite the financial troubles of his family, Nixon, who had an IQ of 131, received a bachelor's degree in history and graduated with honors from Whittier University before attending Duke Law School on scholarship.
The first president of the United States, George Washington, although being thought to have an IQ score of 132.5, never received more than an elementary school education. Regardless, Washington was a surveyor by 17 and a military commander by 23.
Millard Fillmore, the 13th president of the United States, had an estimated IQ of 135.98, which surely came in handy as he tried to make his way as a formally uneducated young man. From these humble beginnings, Fillmore became a lawyer and then president in 1850, without any education.
The 10th president of the United States, John Tyler, had an IQ score of 136.2, which surely helped him during his time at the College of William and Mary, the second-oldest higher-education institution in the United States, from which he graduated at the young age of 17.
Franklin Pierce, despite being considered one of the worst and most destructive presidents in history, had an IQ score of 134.78. An average and harmless student before ascending to the presidency, Pierce adopted aggressive expansionist and anti-abolitionist policies that led directly to the Civil War.
It seems only fitting that one of the most influential presidents in modern memory would also have one of the highest IQ scores. Before his presidency, Roosevelt, who had an IQ of 139.6, attended Columbia Law School but dropped out after successfully passing the New York Bar Exam before graduating.
The 20th and 21st presidents of the United States, James Garfield and Chester Arthur both had an IQ of 141.5. As schoolboys, Garfield and Arthur were both bullied, Garfield for being fatherless, and Arthur for his obesity. But both were also exemplary students, Garfield graduating second in his class and Arthur serving as president of his debate team.
Theodore Roosevelt, affectionately called Teddy, was the 26th president of the US and to this day remains the youngest to ever hold the position, after ascending to the presidency at 42 after the assassination of President William McKinley, under whom Roosevelt had served as vice president. He also had one of the highest IQs of any president at 142.28, and used his brains to breathe new life into the national parks program, kick-start antitrust legislation, and negotiate the treaty that put an end to the Russo-Japanese War.
One of the most famous presidents in American history, Abraham Lincoln had an estimated IQ score of 140, putting him right at the threshold of being considered a genius. Before his legendary presidency, Lincoln taught himself law and became a successful attorney without attending university.
James Madison, the fourth president of the United States, had an IQ of 141.25 and was a young and exceptional student at Princeton University, completing his three-year degree in only two. He would go on to be one of the primary draft writers of the Constitution, earning him the honorary title of the "Father of the Constitution."
Jimmy Carter and Woodrow Wilson, the 39th and 28th presidents of the US, respectively, are tied with a shared IQ score of 145.1. While Carter had been a perfectly average student and went on to excel in the US Naval Academy, Wilson led a long career in academia before entering politics, as a scholar of history and political science.
John Adams, the second president of the United States and the official founder of the US Navy, boasted an IQ score of 142.5. This genius-level score surely helped him enroll in Harvard at the age of 16, where he studied classic literature in the original Greek and Latin.
Bill Clinton, the 42nd president of the United States and the only president to also be a Rhodes Scholar, has an IQ score of 148.8. With the help of his natural intellect, Clinton was awarded a scholarship to Georgetown University in Virginia, and then his Rhodes Scholarship saw him attend Oxford, until he finally attended Yale Law School.
JFK, who had an IQ of 150.65 and served for three years as the 35th president of the United States, has been cemented in history as one of the most iconic presidents ever to lead the country, acting as a major figure during some of the most turbulent events of the Cold War and becoming the victim of one of the most publicized assassinations the United States has ever seen.
To date, the president who has been estimated to have the highest IQ of all, by quite a wide margin, is John Quincy Adams, the sixth president of the United States, who is thought to have had an astronomically high IQ score of 168.75. From an early age, Adams had shown signs of brilliance, and was an avid reader and translator of classic Greek and Latin texts (thanks largely to his father John Adams' influence). He also infamously kept a diary from the time he was a young boy up until his death.
Sources: (MoneyWise) (Reader's Digest) (Ranker)
See also: US presidents without college degrees
Thomas Jefferson was surely one of the busiest Americans in history. Not only was Jefferson, who had an estimated IQ score of 153.75, the third president of the United States, he was also the president of the American Philosophical Society, the primary author of the Declaration of Independence, and the founder of the University of Virginia.
With 10 presidents between them, William Harrison and Rutherford Hayes both had an estimated IQ score of 133.93. Harrison, the ninth president, held office for only 30 days after falling seriously ill after his inauguration. Hayes, the 19th president, worked as a lawyer before serving and was passionate about defending the rights of formerly enslaved people who escaped from the Southern states.
While it's generally understood now that someone's intelligence can't be reduced to a number, IQ tests can still shine a light on the inner workings of someone's mind, especially if it's impossible to talk to them personally. It's only natural to wonder how figures from history would have scored, and considering the IQ test was only invented in 1905, that leaves quite a few historical figures to speculate on. In 2006, Dean Simonton, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Davis, let his curiosity get the best of him and conducted a study to assign IQ scores to all the US presidents from George Washington all the way up to George W. Bush.
How do you think the presidents of the United States scored? Read on to find out.
IQ rankings of US presidents
Who do you think has the highest IQ?
LIFESTYLE History
While it's generally understood now that someone's intelligence can't be reduced to a number, IQ tests can still shine a light on the inner workings of someone's mind, especially if it's impossible to talk to them personally. It's only natural to wonder how figures from history would have scored, and considering the IQ test was only invented in 1905, that leaves quite a few historical figures to speculate on. In 2006, Dean Simonton, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Davis, let his curiosity get the best of him and conducted a study to assign IQ scores to all the US presidents from George Washington all the way up to George W. Bush.
How do you think the presidents of the United States scored? Read on to find out.