First Email Sent
Ray Tomlinson sent the first email between two computers on ARPANET
October 29, 1971
The Message That Started It All
In October 1971, Ray Tomlinson, a programmer at Bolt Beranek and Newman in Cambridge, Massachusetts, sent the first email between two computers on ARPANET — the early version of the internet. The two computers were side by side in the same room. Tomlinson chose the @ symbol to separate the user's name from the computer's name — a convention still used in every email address today. He later admitted he couldn't remember exactly what the message said, probably something like "QWERTYUIOP."
Why @ and Not Something Else
Tomlinson chose @ because it was on the keyboard, wasn't used in names, and logically meant "at" — user AT machine. It was a practical choice made in minutes with no idea it would become one of the most recognized symbols in the world. Before this, messages on ARPANET could only be sent to other users on the same machine. Tomlinson's innovation allowed messages to travel between different computers on the network — the essential concept of email.
Email Today
Over 300 billion emails are sent every day — roughly 40 for every human on Earth. Email outlasted fax machines, pagers, and many predicted successors. Despite competition from messaging apps, it remains the backbone of business communication and the login credential for most online services. Every company communicating across time zones relies on the system Tomlinson built on a quiet afternoon in 1971, mostly as a demonstration that he could.