Cleve Moler created MATLAB in the late 1970s as a matrix calculator for numerical computing.
Moler was a mathematician and computer scientist who wanted students to use numerical linear algebra packages without writing programs in Fortran. The early system provided interactive access to matrix calculations, which inspired the name MATLAB, short for Matrix Laboratory.
MATLAB later expanded into a full technical computing environment with its own programming language, visualization tools, and specialized toolboxes. MathWorks, founded in 1984 by Jack Little, Cleve Moler, and Steve Bangert, became its commercial developer.
MATLAB is often confused with GNU Octave because Octave offers a broadly compatible open-source alternative. They are separate systems. MATLAB’s original identity, however, was specifically tied to interactive matrix computation and numerical linear algebra.