How much information can your brain store?

How much information can your brain store?

The human brain can store an impressive amount of data as memories, but just how much information is this?


Asked by: Alex Cooper, Preston

Human brains store information in a way that's not easily measured, nor easily comparable with computers. The unofficial record for remembering the digits of pi is 83,431 decimal places, which would require less than a hundred bytes to represent on a computer.

But anyone can instantly recognise several thousand human faces, from almost any angle and irrespective of expression, hairstyle or lighting. To do this with a computer would require storage of hundreds or thousands of gigabytes.

Read more:

Subscribe to BBC Focus magazine for fascinating new Q&As every month and follow @sciencefocusQA on Twitter for your daily dose of fun science facts.

© Getty Images