Top 10 Strongest Men of All Time
This list brings together some of the most legendary figures, celebrated for their extraordinary feats of strength and endurance. These individuals have pushed the limits of human capability, leaving people in awe of what the body can achieve when paired with relentless determination and training.
From record-breaking athletes to historical icons of physical might, this compilation showcases a wide range of incredible talents.
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Angus MacAskill
The absolutely strongest human being ever to have lived. This is based not so much on his feats of strength, but more on his incredible size (height/weight) and body measurements. He was the largest normally proportioned human to have ever lived.
Strongmen aren't giants, and giants aren't strongmen, but Angus was an exception to the rule. A natural giant, there were no medical reasons why he grew so big - 7 ft 9 in, 580 lb, with an 80-inch chest. The only odd feature about him was his oversized hands: 12 inches long and 8 inches wide, the same size as 9-foot-tall Robert Wadlow's.
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Louis Cyr
It's sad that he is largely forgotten since he's been dead for over 100 years, but nobody was ever more dominant than him in strength contests. He never backed down from a challenge and never lost. His final contest ended in a tie when he was 40, sick, and out of shape, being challenged by the second strongest man on Earth at the time. He should be number one.
Louis Cyr (1863-1912) was a French-Canadian strongman with a career spanning the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His recorded feats, including lifting 500 pounds (227 kg) with one finger and backlifting 4,337 pounds (1,967 kg), show Cyr to be, according to former International Federation of BodyBuilding & Fitness chairman Ben Weider, the strongest man ever to have lived.
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Zishe Breitbart
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The Great Gama
Actually, he is the strongest. He lifted 2,500 pounds once, which none of these people could do.
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Joe Greenstein
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Zydrunas Savickas
Mark Henry is so overrated it makes me sick. Yes, he broke records, but that was a long time ago, and those records have since been broken. And all by this guy, Big Z.
Kevin Fast is the strongest puller, yet he is not the strongest overall. Zydrunas is the strongest. Mark Henry's World's Strongest Man is just a stage name.
Lifted 500 lbs over his head. World record. Deadlifted 1,155 lbs. World record. Won 4 World's Strongest Man championships. Kevin Fast is not even strong.
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Andre the Giant
André René Roussimoff (May 19, 1946 - January 28, 1993), better known as André the Giant, was a French professional wrestler and actor dubbed "the Eighth Wonder of the World." He began wrestling in France in 1966 and became a major attraction in North America from the early 1970s through the 1980s, headlining... read more
He stands 7 ft 6 in and weighs 520 lbs. He can crush almost anyone. He should be at least in the top 5.
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Brian Shaw
He has won the World's Strongest Man twice and managed to lift 1,073 pounds while having a torn bicep.
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The Great Antonio
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Paul Anderson
Mr. Anderson's regular daily lifts often exceeded records. He would perform exercises such as a dumbbell curl on the old Mike Douglas Show with a weight that was considerably higher than could be repeated by the world's best, well aware and seemingly unconcerned that no one from the Guinness Book was there. As an avenue to open doors for his story of faith, he let people debate the validity of his accomplishments, while those who excelled on a world-class level, along with anyone who witnessed his feats, could not get it out of their mind what they actually beheld.
Paul Anderson was the strongest man to ever walk the planet. Most of his feats of strength have never been matched, and many never will be. A back lift of 6,270 pounds! Nobody will EVER match that! I saw the guy bench press a Ford pickup truck. Dude was a phenom!
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Ray Williams
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Naim Süleymanoğlu
Among all the "big" guys who are listed here, I propose something different: who has lifted the highest weight compared to their body weight?
The answer is the "Pocket Hercules," Naim Süleymanoğlu. In the 1988 Summer Olympics, he set a record by lifting 190 kg in the clean and jerk - 3.15 times his body weight - which is the highest ratio of clean and jerk to body weight of all time.
This is another approach to the question of who is the strongest man ever.
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Mariusz Pudzianowski
This guy was an amazingly explosive athlete. He was an incredible strongman who won the title 5 times and looked like a bodybuilder.
Pure muscle and strength. This man is a giant in the sport.
He won a record five World's Strongest Man titles.
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Bill Kazmaier
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Kevin Fast
This is the guy whom Hercules, were he alive today, would be checking under his bed for at night. Unbeatable.
The only thing bigger than his muscles is his humility.
No ego, all strength, with the records to prove it.
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Eugen Sandow
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Walter Long
He didn't do any feats of strength to prove he was powerful.
He acted in movies like Pardon Us, The Living Ghost, Any Old Port, and Going Bye Bye. Watch these movies to see how strong he is. He was brave. In The Living Ghost, he pulled and threw people around as if they had no weight. He was also a sharpshooter and did great action scenes in Pardon Us.
In Any Old Port, he was hit by a billiard ball and didn't even feel it. He never pulled planes like Kevin Fast, since no one did that in the black and white era, but he could beat Kevin Fast. Everyone was scared of his strength.
Watch his films to see his strength. He is the strongest man ever born, stronger than anyone on this list.
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Lasha Talakhadze
His records are 223 kg in the snatch and 265 kg in the clean and jerk, 12 kilos more than Taranenko's best, whose record stood for 30 years.
He is the new official strongest man, having broken the world record of Leonid Taranenko at the World Championship of Weightlifting (IWF) in 2017, held in Anaheim, USA. Taranenko held the total record for 29 years and still has the best-ever record in the clean and jerk with 266 kg from 1988.
Now his bests are a 220 kg snatch and a 264 kg clean and jerk.
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Georg Hackenschmidt
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Mark Henry
Mark Jerrold Henry is an American powerlifter, Olympic weightlifter, strongman, and professional wrestler. He is currently signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW). Henry is a former World Heavyweight Champion in WWE and was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2018.
He is the strongest human to ever live. Mark Henry holds the world record for the combined lifts of snatch, clean and jerk, squat, bench press, and deadlift, totaling 3,324.5 lbs, all in drug-tested competitions. This makes him the strongest competition-tested human to have ever lived.
His strength was limitless. He is the only human to ever deadlift, squat, and bench press over 900 lbs, 900 lbs, and 580 lbs, respectively, before the age of 25, all in drug-tested events (unlike the steroid users Eddie Hall, Savickas, etc.). He is even stronger than the great Louis Cyr, who never deadlifted 900 lbs before the age of 25. Moreover, Mark Henry never reached his full potential. If he had devoted his life to strongman and powerlifting, there wouldn't even be a debate.
Angus MacAskill's feats have never been properly verified and have been accused of being apocryphal. In terms of measured events, no one in known human history, by the age of 25, has ever been stronger than Mark Henry. Not Kazmaier (who himself says Henry is the strongest man ever), not Cyr (whose feats have been prone to exaggeration), and not Savickas.
Mark Henry is the strongest (known) human to ever live, and he never reached his full potential.
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Eddie Hall
He is, in my book, the world's strongest man ever right now. I've done a lot of research, and it is really impossible to objectively tell that one man is the strongest ever. But my list would look like this:
1. Eddie Hall
2. Zydrunas Savickas
3. Bill Kazmaier
4. Brian Shaw and Thor
5. Louis Cyr
6. Mariusz Pudzianowski
7. Paul Anderson
8. Mark Henry
9. Vasyl Virastyuk
Only man to lift 500 kg ever, 35 kg over the previous record (which was also his record). There is no possible argument.
Pound for pound, the strongest of all time.
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Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson
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Benedikt Magnusson
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Riku Kiri
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Stanislaw Zbyszko Cyganiewicz
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Bruce Lee
Bruce Lee (November 27, 1940 - July 20, 1973) was a Hong Kong and American martial artist, instructor, actor, director, screenwriter, producer, and philosopher. He founded Jeet Kune Do, a hybrid martial arts philosophy that influenced modern mixed martial arts (MMA). Lee is widely considered one of the... read more
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Magnus Ver Magnusson