Which ancient device is often called the world’s first analog computer?

The Antikythera mechanism is often called the world’s first analog computer.

This complex geared device was recovered from a shipwreck near the Greek island of Antikythera in 1901. Researchers date it to around the second or early first century BCE. Its bronze gears and inscriptions indicate that it modeled astronomical cycles and displayed positions associated with the Sun, Moon, and possibly planets.

The mechanism could track the lunar month, predict eclipses through the Saros cycle, and represent the Greek calendar and the four-year cycle of the Olympic Games. Its sophistication is unusual because comparable geared astronomical instruments are not documented again until many centuries later.

Only fragments survive, and its exact original appearance remains reconstructed from imaging and analysis. It was not a modern computer, but its mechanical calculations justify the commonly used description “analog computer.”