About the Mega Society

The Mega Society is a high IQ society open to people who have scored at the one-in-a-million level on a test of general intelligence credibly claimed to be able to discriminate at that level.[1] The Guinness Book of World Records stated that:[2]

The most elite ultra High IQ Society is the Mega Society with 26 members with percentiles of 99.9999 or 1 in a million.[3]

The public profile of the Mega Society increased with the publication of the Mega Test in 1985 by Dr. Hoeflin.[4] Notable people who took the Mega Test, meeting the Mega Society entrance requirements, include author and columnist Marilyn vos Savant, mathematician Solomon W. Golomb, Chris Langan, and former governor of New Hampshire and White House Chief of Staff John H. Sununu.[5]

Noesis is the journal of the Mega Society. Brian Wiksell is the Administrator of the Mega Society. Inquiries regarding membership should be directed to him via email at bwiksell@megasociety.org. We are working to put past issues of Noesis and its predecessor, the Megarian, onto the Web. Anyone interested in working on this project should contact the Internet Officer.

Noesis is distributed via email and archived on the Society Web site.  Members and non-members who wish to receive it should contact the Editor.

Members are invited to join the list mega@groups.io.

Mega Society History

The Society was founded in 1982 by Dr. Ronald K. Hoeflin to facilitate psychometric research.[6] The 606 Society (6 in 106), founded by Christopher Harding, was incorporated into the new society and those with IQ scores on Kevin Langdon’s Adult Intelligence Test (LAIT) of 173 or more were also invited to join. The LAIT qualifying score was subsequently raised to 175; official scoring of the LAIT terminated at the end of 1993, after the test was compromised. A number of different tests were accepted by 606 and during the first few years of Mega’s existence. Later, the LAIT and Dr. Hoeflin’s Mega Test became the sole official entrance tests, by vote of the membership. The Mega was also compromised, so scores after 1994 are currently not accepted. Following the retirement of the Mega Test, Dr. Hoeflin's Titan Test was added by vote of the membership, but was retired in 2020 due to also having been compromised. More recently, Dr. Hoeflin's Ultra Test and Power Test were added to the list of acceptable tests with a required score of 70 and 34, respectively.



[1] Mega Society (August 2005). Constitution of the Mega Society.

[2] (1983-1990) “Highest I.Q.”, Guinness Superlatives Ltd. The Guinness Book of World Records, 18. ISBN 0-85112-433-X

[3] As of October 2024, there are 36 active members, excluding non-member qualifiers those who are deceased. The figure of 26 members is a direct quote from the Guinness Book of World Records entry at the time of its publication.

[4] Hoeflin, Ronald K. "World's Most Difficult IQ Test.", Omni magazine, April 1985, pp. 128 ff.

Seipp, Catherine, "Brains -- They’re the smartest people in L.A.", Los Angeles (magazine), November 1987, pp. 210–216.

Graham, Ellen, "For Minds of Mega, the Mensa Test, is a Real No-Brainer", The Wall Street Journal subs. req., April 9, 1992, p. A1.

Simonton, Dean Keith (1994). Greatness: Who makes History and Why. Guilford Press, 225. ISBN 0-89862-201-8.

"Genius Issue", Esquire (magazine), November 1999.

(1999) Lawrence A Pervin, Oliver P John (editors) Handbook of Personality. Guilford Press, 632. ISBN 1-57230-695-5.

Jacobs, A. J. (2004). The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Man in the World. Simon & Schuster, 243. ISBN 0-7432-5060-5

[5] "Mind Games: the hardest IQ test you'll ever love suffering through," Omni magazine, April 1990, pp. 90 ff.

Baumgold, Julie. "New York magazine", February 6, 1989.

Anderson, Jack; Dale Van Atta, "Is 176 I.Q. Enough for White House?", Washington Post, November 28, 1988.

Introduction to the Hoeflin Tests. Similar reports about the actress Uma Thurman are an urban myth.

[6] Rachel Aviv. "The Intelligencer," Village Voice, August 2, 2006. This article is primarily a biography of and interview with Dr Hoeflin.