Methodology
What this map is for
This is not a list of what happened in AI but a reasoned map of what the present grew out of. The rest of the rules on this page follow from that: every claim has a source, every date carries only the precision its source will bear, and whatever is not here yet is named as missing rather than invented. An empty stretch here is a statement about the collection, not about history.
Alpha release
These records come from automated research passes over primary sources: each carries a link to its source and keeps dates at the precision the source supports. On 27 September 2026 a person accepted the site as a whole, which is not an acceptance of every record: review by a person is recorded on the record itself, and most records have not had it yet. Such a record is badged "Sources gathered automatically" rather than "Sources checked". The site itself is still being checked and worked on, which is why this is an alpha release. Treat an error you spot as likely rather than surprising.
Start now, trace backwards
The collection covers five topics: language models and assistants, images, robotics and autonomous systems, multimodal models, and their scientific foundations. A topic says what a record is about, and the axis draws it as colour and shape. Beyond its topic, a record can belong to up to three lines that run across the collection, such as compute, data, evaluation, work or safety; they are gathered on the Lines page and are not drawn on the axis. We select documented changes and follow them back to the work that came before. It is a growing collection, not a complete ranking of AI history.
Dates keep their real precision
An event and an article about it are different records. Research publication, announcement and actual availability are distinct events when the evidence supports that distinction. Unknown months or days stay unknown. A primary publication contemporary with the event can be an explicitly labelled timeline anchor within the known event interval; retrospective reporting cannot move an event.
Connections need evidence
Builds on, extends, enables and contrasts describe claims supported by the linked sources; a link of these kinds without a source fails the data check. Related means a topical connection selected by the editor, without a causal claim. Explanations of significance are editorial interpretations; source claims and limitations remain visible.
Many languages, one record
The atlas starts in Ukrainian and English. Only reviewed translations matching the current content version are published; during the alpha they were reviewed by the same automated passes as the records. If a translation is unavailable or outdated, a complete reviewed fallback is shown with its language labelled. Further languages can be enabled through the locale registry and interface dictionaries.
From source to published record
Records reach the atlas through research passes: a pass reads primary sources, writes each record in both languages and hands the batch over for integration. Nothing is published unless the whole collection passes the data checks: a causal connection needs a source, dates keep their real precision, and a published translation is reviewed for the record's current version. When a record's text is rewritten, that version has to rise with it, so a translation nobody rechecked stops being shown as current. Canonical JSON files are versioned with Git. Review by a person is recorded on the record itself, and the badge beside each record says whether it has had one; most have not yet, as the Alpha release section says.
A growing collection
An empty period means the collection holds no matching record yet, not that nothing happened. The current interface is a timeline: a period can be zoomed into, and a crowded span collapses into a mark carrying its count. Search on the axis looks through titles, summaries and the names of the people, organizations and models a record mentions, and lights what it finds on the axis itself; there are no separate filters, because those names are searched as text. The whole collection, the same records the axis draws, is also on the All records page, which works without JavaScript.
How to read the axis
The key under the axis explains the marks and the topic colours. The other lines on the axis mean this.
Hatching: the collection holds no record in this period. It does not mean nothing happened then, only that the collection does not cover it yet.
A solid band along the axis: the record spans a stretch of time, not an instant. A date known only to the month or the year, or an event that lasted several days, runs across its whole stretch, and the mark sits in the middle of it.
A dashed band and a hollow mark: the record’s date is broader than the period on the axis, for instance only its year is known while the axis shows months. The mark sits in the middle of that stretch, but no period beneath it counts the record, so a 0 may stand beside it. The “No finer date” button below the axis lists these records.
A solid arc: a connection its sources support, “Builds on”, “Extends”, or “Enables”. Arcs appear when the pointer or the focus is on a mark, and run from it to the records it is connected to.
A dashed arc: “Related” or “Contrasts”, a connection by topic or a contrast, with no claim that one record caused the other.
Rings: a fine dashed ring circles the record the arcs leave from, and a solid ring each record at the far end of an arc.
The atlas offline and on your home screen
After a first visit, the timeline and its records' text in your language open without a network, and so do the records you saved with the star and the pages you opened recently. A copy shown offline is labelled with the time it was saved; whenever there is a network, a page is fetched fresh. The atlas can be installed as an app: on Android and a computer, through the browser's Install prompt or its menu; on iPhone and iPad, in Safari, Share → Add to Home Screen. What you save stays in your browser only.