Mathematics

Abel Prize: winners and how it is awarded

The Abel Prize honours outstanding contributions to mathematics and has been awarded since 2003. Britannica dates the Niels Henrik Abel Memorial Fund to 2002, while Wikipedia says the Government of Norway established the prize in 2001. The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters announces the laureate each March.^1,5,2

How the winner is chosen

Anyone may submit a nomination, but self nominations are not permitted and the nominee must be alive. An Abel Committee of five mathematicians, elected by the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters on nominations from the International Mathematical Union and the European Mathematical Society, recommends a laureate. The Academy announces the winner each March on the committee's recommendation.

Winners

1. 2026Gerd Faltings^2,4For introducing powerful tools in arithmetic geometry and resolving long standing Diophantine conjectures of Mordell and Lang
2. 2025Masaki Kashiwara³For fundamental contributions to algebraic analysis and representation theory, in particular the theory of D-modules and the discovery of crystal bases
3. 2024Michel Talagrand¹Groundbreaking contributions to probability theory and functional analysis
4. 2023Luis Caffarelli¹Seminal contributions to regularity theory for nonlinear partial differential equations
5. 2022Dennis Sullivan¹Groundbreaking contributions to topology in its broadest sense
6. 2021László Lovász, Avi Wigderson¹Foundational contributions to theoretical computer science and discrete mathematics
7. 2020Hillel Furstenberg, Grigory Margulis¹Pioneering the use of methods from probability and dynamics in group theory, number theory and combinatorics
8. 2019Karen Uhlenbeck¹Pioneering achievements in geometric partial differential equations, gauge theory and integrable systems
9. 2018Robert Langlands¹A visionary program connecting representation theory to number theory
10. 2017Yves Meyer¹A pivotal role in developing the mathematical theory of wavelets
11. 2016Andrew Wiles¹His proof of Fermat's Last Theorem
12. 2015John F. Nash Jr., Louis Nirenberg¹Contributions to the theory of nonlinear partial differential equations
13. 2014Yakov Sinai¹Fundamental contributions to dynamical systems, ergodic theory and mathematical physics

Notable facts

Sources

1. Encyclopaedia Britannica, Abel Prize (27 October 2026)
2. Norway in Malaysia (Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Gerd Faltings awarded the 2026 Abel Prize (19 March 2026)
3. Norway in South Korea (Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Japanese mathematician Masaki Kashiwara awarded the Abel Prize 2025 (2025)
4. London Mathematical Society, Professor Gerd Faltings awarded the 2026 Abel Prize (20 March 2026)
5. Wikipedia, Abel Prize (27 October 2026)