Many mathematical problems have been stated but not yet solved. These problems come from many areas of mathematics, such as theoretical physics, computer science, algebra, analysis, combinatorics, algebraic, differential, discrete and Euclidean geometries, graph theory, group theory, model theory, number theory, set theory, Ramsey theory, dynamical systems, and partial differential equations. Some problems belong to more than one discipline and are studied using techniques from different areas. Prizes are often awarded for the solution to a long-standing problem, and some lists of unsolved problems, such as the Millennium Prize Problems, receive considerable attention.
This list is a composite of notable unsolved problems mentioned in previously published lists, including but not limited to lists considered authoritative, and the problems listed here vary widely in both difficulty and importance.
Notable lists
Various mathematicians and organizations have published and promoted lists of unsolved mathematical problems. In some cases, the lists have been associated with prizes for the discoverers of solutions.
Millennium Prize Problems
Of the original seven Millennium Prize Problems listed by the Clay Mathematics Institute in 2000, six remain unsolved to date:
The seventh problem, the Poincaré conjecture, was solved by Grigori Perelman in 2003. However, a generalization called the smooth four-dimensional Poincaré conjectureâÂÂthat is, whether a four-dimensional topological sphere can have two or more inequivalent smooth structuresâÂÂis unsolved.
Notebooks
Unsolved problems
Algebra
- BirchâÂÂTate conjecture on the relation between the order of the center of the Steinberg group of the ring of integers of a number field to the field's Dedekind zeta function.
- Casas-Alvero conjecture: if a polynomial of degree defined over a field of characteristic has a factor in common with its first through -th derivative, then must be the -th power of a linear polynomial?
- Connes embedding problem in Von Neumann algebra theory
- Crouzeix's conjecture: the matrix norm of a complex function applied to a complex matrix is at most twice the supremum of over the field of values of .
- Determinantal conjecture on the determinant of the sum of two normal matrices.
- EilenbergâÂÂGanea conjecture: a group with cohomological dimension 2 also has a 2-dimensional EilenbergâÂÂMacLane space .
- FarrellâÂÂJones conjecture on whether certain assembly maps are isomorphisms.
- Bost conjecture: a specific case of the FarrellâÂÂJones conjecture
- Finite lattice representation problem: is every finite lattice isomorphic to the congruence lattice of some finite algebra?
- Goncharov conjecture on the cohomology of certain motivic complexes.
- Green's conjecture: the Clifford index of a non-hyperelliptic curve is determined by the extent to which it, as a canonical curve, has linear syzygies.
- GrothendieckâÂÂKatz p-curvature conjecture: a conjectured localâÂÂglobal principle for linear ordinary differential equations.
- Hadamard conjecture: for every positive integer , a Hadamard matrix of order exists.
- Williamson conjecture: the problem of finding Williamson matrices, which can be used to construct Hadamard matrices.
- Hadamard's maximal determinant problem: what is the largest determinant of a matrix with entries all equal to 1 or âÂÂ1?
- Hilbert's fifteenth problem: put Schubert calculus on a rigorous foundation.
- Hilbert's sixteenth problem: what are the possible configurations of the connected components of M-curves?
- Homological conjectures in commutative algebra
- Jacobson's conjecture: the intersection of all powers of the Jacobson radical of a left-and-right Noetherian ring is precisely 0.
- Kaplansky's conjectures
- Köthe conjecture: if a ring has no nil ideal other than , then it has no nil one-sided ideal other than .
- Monomial conjecture on Noetherian local rings
- Existence of perfect cuboids and associated cuboid conjectures
- PierceâÂÂBirkhoff conjecture: every piecewise-polynomial is the maximum of a finite set of minimums of finite collections of polynomials.
- Rota's basis conjecture: for matroids of rank with disjoint bases , it is possible to create an matrix whose rows are and whose columns are also bases.
- Serre's conjecture II: if is a simply connected semisimple algebraic group over a perfect field of cohomological dimension at most , then the Galois cohomology set is zero.
- Serre's positivity conjecture that if is a commutative regular local ring, and are prime ideals of , then implies .
- Uniform boundedness conjecture for rational points: do algebraic curves of genus over number fields have at most some bounded number of -rational points?
- Wild problems: problems involving classification of pairs of matrices under simultaneous conjugation.
- ZariskiâÂÂLipman conjecture: for a complex algebraic variety with coordinate ring , if the derivations of are a free module over , then is smooth.
- Zauner's conjecture: do SIC-POVMs exist in all dimensions?
- ZilberâÂÂPink conjecture that if is a mixed Shimura variety or semiabelian variety defined over , and is a subvariety, then contains only finitely many maximal atypical subvarieties.
Group theory
Representation theory
Analysis
Combinatorics
Dynamical systems
Games and puzzles
Combinatorial games
Games with imperfect information
Geometry
Algebraic geometry
Covering and packing
- Borsuk's problem on upper and lower bounds for the number of smaller-diameter subsets needed to cover a bounded n-dimensional set.
- The covering problem of Rado: if the union of finitely many axis-parallel squares has unit area, how small can the largest area covered by a disjoint subset of squares be?
- The ErdÃ
ÂsâÂÂOler conjecture: when is a triangular number, packing circles in an equilateral triangle requires a triangle of the same size as packing circles.
- The disk covering problem about finding the smallest real number such that disks of radius can be arranged in such a way as to cover the unit disk.
- The kissing number problem for dimensions other than 1, 2, 3, 4, 8 and 24
- Reinhardt's conjecture: the smoothed octagon has the lowest maximum packing density of all centrally-symmetric convex plane sets
- Sphere packing problems, including the density of the densest packing in dimensions other than 1, 2, 3, 8 and 24, and its asymptotic behavior for high dimensions.
- Square packing in a square: what is the asymptotic growth rate of wasted space?
- Ulam's packing conjecture about the identity of the worst-packing convex solid
- The Tammes problem for numbers of nodes greater than 14 (except 24).
Differential geometry
Discrete geometry
Euclidean geometry
* Are the two Meissner tetrahedra the minimum-volume three-dimensional shapes of constant width?
- Moser's worm problem â what is the smallest area of a shape that can cover every unit-length curve in the plane?
- The moving sofa problem â what is the largest area of a shape that can be maneuvered through a unit-width L-shaped corridor?
- In parallelohedron:
- Can every spherical non-convex polyhedron that tiles space by translation have its faces grouped into patches with the same combinatorial structure as a parallelohedron?
- Does every higher-dimensional tiling by translations of convex polytope tiles have an affine transformation taking it to a Voronoi diagram?
- Ropelength problems:
- Is there a general expression for the minimum ropelength of an arbitrary closed knot?
- What constant governs the lower bound of a closed knot 's minimum ropelength ?
- Is the upper bound of a closed knot's minimum ropelength linear to its crossing number?
- Is there a general expression for how much the ends of a long rope of radius 1 get closer when a tight open knot is tied into it?
- Does every convex polyhedron have Rupert's property?
- Shephard's problem (a.k.a. Dürer's conjecture) â does every convex polyhedron have a net, or simple edge-unfolding?
- Is there a non-convex polyhedron without self-intersections with more than seven faces, all of which share an edge with each other?
- The Thomson problem â what is the minimum energy configuration of mutually-repelling particles on a unit sphere?
- Convex uniform 5-polytopes â find and classify the complete set of these shapes
Non-Euclidean geometry
Graph theory
Algebraic graph theory
Games on graphs
Graph coloring and labeling
Graph drawing and embedding
Restriction of graph parameters
Subgraphs
Word-representation of graphs
Miscellaneous graph theory
Model theory and formal languages
- The CherlinâÂÂZilber conjecture: A simple group whose first-order theory is stable in is a simple algebraic group over an algebraically closed field.
- Generalized star height problem: can all regular languages be expressed using generalized regular expressions with limited nesting depths of Kleene stars?
- For which number fields does Hilbert's tenth problem hold?
- Kueker's conjecture
- The main gap conjecture, e.g. for uncountable first order theories, for AECs, and for -saturated models of a countable theory.
- Shelah's categoricity conjecture for : If a sentence is categorical above the Hanf number then it is categorical in all cardinals above the Hanf number.
- Shelah's eventual categoricity conjecture: For every cardinal there exists a cardinal such that if an AEC K with LS(K) is categorical in a cardinal above then it is categorical in all cardinals above .
- The stable field conjecture: every infinite field with a stable first-order theory is separably closed.
- The stable forking conjecture for simple theories
- Tarski's exponential function problem: is the theory of the real numbers with the exponential function decidable?
- The universality problem for C-free graphs: For which finite sets C of graphs does the class of C-free countable graphs have a universal member under strong embeddings?
- The universality spectrum problem: Is there a first-order theory whose universality spectrum is minimum?
- Vaught conjecture: the number of countable models of a first-order complete theory in a countable language is either finite, , or .
- Assume K is the class of models of a countable first order theory omitting countably many types. If K has a model of cardinality does it have a model of cardinality continuum?
- Do the Henson graphs have the finite model property?
- Does a finitely presented homogeneous structure for a finite relational language have finitely many reducts?
- Does there exist an o-minimal first order theory with a trans-exponential (rapid growth) function?
- If the class of atomic models of a complete first order theory is categorical in the , is it categorical in every cardinal?
- Is every infinite, minimal field of characteristic zero algebraically closed? (Here, "minimal" means that every definable subset of the structure is finite or co-finite.)
- Is the Borel monadic theory of the real order (BMTO) decidable? Is the monadic theory of well-ordering (MTWO) consistently decidable?
- Is the theory of the field of Laurent series over decidable? of the field of polynomials over ?
- Is there a logic L which satisfies both the Beth property and ÃÂ-interpolation, is compact but does not satisfy the interpolation property?
- Determine the structure of Keisler's order.
- What is the nature of the proof-theoretic ordinal (the smallest ordinal a theory cannot prove well-founded) for second-order arithmetic, ZFC, or stronger theories?
Probability theory
Number theory
General
Additive number theory
Algebraic number theory
Analytic number theory
Arithmetic geometry
Computational number theory
Diophantine approximation and transcendental number theory
Diophantine equations
Prime numbers
- AgohâÂÂGiuga conjecture on the Bernoulli numbers that is prime if and only if
- Agrawal's conjecture that given coprime positive integers and , if , then either is prime or
- Artin's conjecture on primitive roots that if an integer is neither a perfect square nor , then it is a primitive root modulo infinitely many prime numbers
- Brocard's conjecture: there are always at least prime numbers between consecutive squares of prime numbers, aside from and .
- Bunyakovsky conjecture: if an integer-coefficient polynomial has a positive leading coefficient, is irreducible over the integers, and has no common factors over all where is a positive integer, then is prime infinitely often.
- Catalan's Mersenne conjecture: some CatalanâÂÂMersenne number is composite and thus all CatalanâÂÂMersenne numbers are composite after some point.
- Dickson's conjecture: for a finite set of linear forms with each , there are infinitely many for which all forms are prime, unless there is some congruence condition preventing it.
- Dubner's conjecture: every even number greater than is the sum of two primes which both have a twin.
- ElliottâÂÂHalberstam conjecture on the distribution of prime numbers in arithmetic progressions.
- ErdÃ
ÂsâÂÂMollinâÂÂWalsh conjecture: no three consecutive numbers are all powerful.
- FeitâÂÂThompson conjecture: for all distinct prime numbers and , does not divide
- Fortune's conjecture that no Fortunate number is composite.
- The Gaussian moat problem: is it possible to find an infinite sequence of distinct Gaussian prime numbers such that the difference between consecutive numbers in the sequence is bounded?
- Gillies' conjecture on the distribution of prime divisors of Mersenne numbers.
- Landau's problems
- Goldbach conjecture: all even natural numbers greater than are the sum of two prime numbers.
- Legendre's conjecture: for every positive integer , there is a prime between and .
- Twin prime conjecture: there are infinitely many twin primes.
- Are there infinitely many primes of the form ?
- Problems associated to Linnik's theorem
- New Mersenne conjecture: for any odd natural number , if any two of the three conditions or , is prime, and is prime are true, then the third condition is also true.
- Polignac's conjecture: for all positive even numbers , there are infinitely many prime gaps of size .
- Schinzel's hypothesis H that for every finite collection of nonconstant irreducible polynomials over the integers with positive leading coefficients, either there are infinitely many positive integers for which are all primes, or there is some fixed divisor which, for all , divides some .
- Selfridge's conjecture: is 78,557 the lowest SierpiÃ
Âski number?
- Does the converse of Wolstenholme's theorem hold for all natural numbers?
- Are all Euclid numbers square-free?
- Are all Fermat numbers square-free?
- Are all Mersenne numbers of prime index square-free?
- Are there any composite c satisfying 2<sup>c â 1</sup> â¡ 1 (mod c<sup>2</sup>)?
- Are there any WallâÂÂSunâÂÂSun primes?
- Are there any Wieferich primes in base 47?
- Are there infinitely many balanced primes?
- Are there infinitely many cluster primes?
- Are there infinitely many cousin primes?
- Are there infinitely many Cullen primes?
- Are there infinitely many Euclid primes?
- Are there infinitely many Fibonacci primes?
- Are there infinitely many Kummer primes?
- Are there infinitely many Kynea primes?
- Are there infinitely many Lucas primes?
- Are there infinitely many Mersenne primes (LenstraâÂÂPomeranceâÂÂWagstaff conjecture); equivalently, infinitely many even perfect numbers?
- Are there infinitely many NewmanâÂÂShanksâÂÂWilliams primes?
- Are there infinitely many palindromic primes to every base?
- Are there infinitely many Pell primes?
- Are there infinitely many Pierpont primes?
- Are there infinitely many prime quadruplets?
- Are there infinitely many prime triplets?
- Siegel's conjecture: are there infinitely many regular primes, and if so is their natural density as a subset of all primes ?
- Are there infinitely many sexy primes?
- Are there infinitely many safe and Sophie Germain primes?
- Are there infinitely many Wagstaff primes?
- Are there infinitely many Wieferich primes?
- Are there infinitely many Wilson primes?
- Are there infinitely many Wolstenholme primes?
- Are there infinitely many Woodall primes?
- Can a prime p satisfy and simultaneously?
- Does every prime number appear in the EuclidâÂÂMullin sequence?
- What is the smallest Skewes's number?
- For any given integer a > 0, are there infinitely many LucasâÂÂWieferich primes associated with the pair (a, âÂÂ1)? (Specially, when a = 1, this is the Fibonacci-Wieferich primes, and when a = 2, this is the Pell-Wieferich primes)
- For any given integer a > 0, are there infinitely many primes p such that a<sup>p â 1</sup> â¡ 1 (mod p<sup>2</sup>)?
- For any given integer b which is not a perfect power and not of the form âÂÂ4k<sup>4</sup> for integer k, are there infinitely many repunit primes to base b?
- For any given integers , with and are there infinitely many primes of the form with integer n âÂÂ¥ 1?
- Is every Fermat number composite for ?
- Is 509,203 the lowest Riesel number?
Set theory
Note: The following conjectures are expressed in the first-order language of axiomatic set theory and, unless stated otherwise, are here taken to be over Zermelo-Frankel set theory, possibly with Choice. In particular, the conjecture's independence may not be open in set theories with a wider or conflicting class of models, such as the various constructive resp. non-wellfounded set theories, etc.
Topology
Problems solved since 1995
Algebra
Analysis
- MizohataâÂÂTakeuchi conjecture (Hannah Cairo, 2025).
- KadisonâÂÂSinger problem (Adam Marcus, Daniel Spielman and Nikhil Srivastava, 2013) (and the Feichtinger's conjecture, Anderson's paving conjectures, Weaver's discrepancy theoretic and conjectures, Bourgain-Tzafriri conjecture and -conjecture)
- Ahlfors measure conjecture (Ian Agol, 2004)
- Gradient conjecture (Krzysztof Kurdyka, Tadeusz Mostowski, Adam Parusinski, 1999)
Combinatorics
- ErdÃ
Âs sumset conjecture (Joel Moreira, Florian Richter, Donald Robertson, 2018)
- McMullen's g-conjecture on the possible numbers of faces of different dimensions in a simplicial sphere (also Grünbaum conjecture, several conjectures of Kühnel) (Karim Adiprasito, 2018)
- Hirsch conjecture (Francisco Santos Leal, 2010)
- Gessel's lattice path conjecture (Manuel Kauers, Christoph Koutschan, and Doron Zeilberger, 2009)
- StanleyâÂÂWilf conjecture (Gábor Tardos and Adam Marcus, 2004) (and also the AlonâÂÂFriedgut conjecture)
- Kemnitz's conjecture (Christian Reiher, 2003, Carlos di Fiore, 2003)
- CameronâÂÂErdÃ
Âs conjecture (Ben J. Green, 2003, Alexander Sapozhenko, 2003)
Dynamical systems
Game theory
Geometry
21st century
- Carathéodory conjecture for surfaces of smoothness (Brendan Guilfoyle and Wilhelm Klingenberg, 2025)
- Einstein problem (David Smith, Joseph Samuel Myers, Craig S. Kaplan, Chaim Goodman-Strauss, 2024)
- Maximal rank conjecture (Eric Larson, 2018)
- Weibel's conjecture (Moritz Kerz, Florian Strunk, and Georg Tamme, 2018)
- Yau's conjecture (Antoine Song, 2018)
- Pentagonal tiling (Michaël Rao, 2017)
- Willmore conjecture (Fernando Codá Marques and André Neves, 2012)
- ErdÃ
Âs distinct distances problem (Larry Guth, Nets Hawk Katz, 2011)
- Heterogeneous tiling conjecture (squaring the plane) (Frederick V. Henle and James M. Henle, 2008)
- Tameness conjecture (Ian Agol, 2004)
- Ending lamination theorem (Jeffrey F. Brock, Richard D. Canary, Yair N. Minsky, 2004)
- Carpenter's rule problem (Robert Connelly, Erik Demaine, Günter Rote, 2003)
- Lambda g conjecture (Carel Faber and Rahul Pandharipande, 2003)
- Nagata's conjecture (Ivan Shestakov, Ualbai Umirbaev, 2003)
- Double bubble conjecture (Michael Hutchings, Frank Morgan, Manuel Ritoré, Antonio Ros, 2002)
20th century
Graph theory
- KahnâÂÂKalai conjecture (Jinyoung Park and Huy Tuan Pham, 2022)
- BlankenshipâÂÂOporowski conjecture on the book thickness of subdivisions (Vida DujmoviÃÂ, David Eppstein, Robert Hickingbotham, Pat Morin, and David Wood, 2021)
- Ringel's conjecture that the complete graph can be decomposed into copies of any tree with edges (Richard Montgomery, Benny Sudakov, Alexey Pokrovskiy, 2020)
- Disproof of Hedetniemi's conjecture on the chromatic number of tensor products of graphs (Yaroslav Shitov, 2019)
- KelmansâÂÂSeymour conjecture (Dawei He, Yan Wang, and Xingxing Yu, 2020)
- GoldbergâÂÂSeymour conjecture (Guantao Chen, Guangming Jing, and Wenan Zang, 2019)
- Babai's problem (Alireza Abdollahi, Maysam Zallaghi, 2015)
- Alspach's conjecture (Darryn Bryant, Daniel Horsley, William Pettersson, 2014)
- AlonâÂÂSaksâÂÂSeymour conjecture (Hao Huang, Benny Sudakov, 2012)
- ReadâÂÂHoggar conjecture (June Huh, 2009)
- Scheinerman's conjecture (Jeremie Chalopin and Daniel Gonçalves, 2009)
- ErdÃ
ÂsâÂÂMenger conjecture (Ron Aharoni, Eli Berger 2007)
- Road coloring conjecture (Avraham Trahtman, 2007)
- RobertsonâÂÂSeymour theorem (Neil Robertson, Paul Seymour, 2004)
- Strong perfect graph conjecture (Maria Chudnovsky, Neil Robertson, Paul Seymour and Robin Thomas, 2002)
- Toida's conjecture (Mikhail Muzychuk, Mikhail Klin, and Reinhard Pöschel, 2001)
- Harary's conjecture on the integral sum number of complete graphs (Zhibo Chen, 1996)
Group theory
Number theory
21st century
- AndréâÂÂOort conjecture (Jonathan Pila, Ananth Shankar, Jacob Tsimerman, 2021)
- DuffinâÂÂSchaeffer theorem (Dimitris Koukoulopoulos, James Maynard, 2019)
- Main conjecture in Vinogradov's mean-value theorem (Jean Bourgain, Ciprian Demeter, Larry Guth, 2015)
- Goldbach's weak conjecture (Harald Helfgott, 2013)
- Existence of bounded gaps between arbitrarily large primes (Yitang Zhang, Polymath8, James Maynard, 2013)
- Sidon set problem (Javier Cilleruelo, Imre Z. Ruzsa, and Carlos Vinuesa, 2010)
- Serre's modularity conjecture (Chandrashekhar Khare and Jean-Pierre Wintenberger, 2008)
- GreenâÂÂTao theorem (Ben J. Green and Terence Tao, 2004)
- Catalan's conjecture (Preda MihÃÂilescu, 2002)
- ErdÃ
ÂsâÂÂGraham problem (Ernest S. Croot III, 2000)
20th century
Ramsey theory
Theoretical computer science
Topology
- Deciding whether the Conway knot is a slice knot (Lisa Piccirillo, 2020)
- Virtual Haken conjecture (Ian Agol, Daniel Groves, Jason Manning, 2012) (and by work of Daniel Wise also virtually fibered conjecture)
- HsiangâÂÂLawson's conjecture (Simon Brendle, 2012)
- Ehrenpreis conjecture (Jeremy Kahn, Vladimir Markovic, 2011)
- Atiyah conjecture for groups with finite subgroups of unbounded order (Austin, 2009)
- Cobordism hypothesis (Jacob Lurie, 2008)
- Spherical space form conjecture (Grigori Perelman, 2006)
- Poincaré conjecture (Grigori Perelman, 2002)
- Geometrization conjecture (Grigori Perelman, series of preprints in 2002âÂÂ2003)
- Nikiel's conjecture (Mary Ellen Rudin, 1999)
- Disproof of the Ganea conjecture (Iwase, 1997)
Uncategorised
2010s
- ErdÃ
Âs discrepancy problem (Terence Tao, 2015)
- Umbral moonshine conjecture (John F. R. Duncan, Michael J. Griffin, Ken Ono, 2015)
- Anderson conjecture on the finite number of diffeomorphism classes of the collection of 4-manifolds satisfying certain properties (Jeff Cheeger, Aaron Naber, 2014)
- Gaussian correlation inequality (Thomas Royen, 2014)
- Beck's conjecture on discrepancies of set systems constructed from three permutations (Alantha Newman, Aleksandar Nikolov, 2011)
- BlochâÂÂKato conjecture (Vladimir Voevodsky, 2011) (and QuillenâÂÂLichtenbaum conjecture and by work of Thomas Geisser and Marc Levine (2001) also BeilinsonâÂÂLichtenbaum conjecture)
2000s
- KauffmanâÂÂHarary conjecture (Thomas Mattman, Pablo Solis, 2009)
- Surface subgroup conjecture (Jeremy Kahn, Vladimir Markovic, 2009)
- Normal scalar curvature conjecture and the BöttcherâÂÂWenzel conjecture (Zhiqin Lu, 2007)
- NirenbergâÂÂTreves conjecture (Nils Dencker, 2005)
- Lax conjecture (Adrian Lewis, Pablo Parrilo, Motakuri Ramana, 2005)
- The LanglandsâÂÂShelstad fundamental lemma (Ngô Bảo Châu and Gérard Laumon, 2004)
- Milnor conjecture (Vladimir Voevodsky, 2003)
- Kirillov's conjecture (Ehud Baruch, 2003)
- Kouchnirenko's conjecture (Bertrand Haas, 2002)
- n! conjecture (Mark Haiman, 2001) (and also Macdonald positivity conjecture)
- Kato's conjecture (Pascal Auscher, Steve Hofmann, Michael Lacey, Alan McIntosh, and Philipp Tchamitchian, 2001)
- Deligne's conjecture on 1-motives (Luca Barbieri-Viale, Andreas Rosenschon, Morihiko Saito, 2001)
- Modularity theorem (Christophe Breuil, Brian Conrad, Fred Diamond, and Richard Taylor, 2001)
- ErdÃ
ÂsâÂÂStewart conjecture (Florian Luca, 2001)
- BerryâÂÂRobbins problem (Michael Atiyah, 2000)
See also
Notes
References
Further reading
Books discussing problems solved since 1995
Books discussing unsolved problems
External links