Caveat Academics · Study Skills · Free tool

All of world history
on one line you can zoom.

Five thousand years in region lanes, from the first writing in Sumer to the present. Filter by theme, read each event, then quiz yourself on the order and the dates.

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Five thousand years, zoomable

Choose an era or zoom freely. Lanes keep each region in its row, so you can see what happened at the same time in different parts of the world.

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Reading historical dates

Four conventions that trip students up on tests, and how the timeline shows each one.

There is no year 0

Historians count 1 BCE, then 1 CE. So the Han dynasty, 206 BCE to 220 CE, lasted 425 years, not 426. The timeline does this arithmetic for you.

1 BCE1 CE
BCE and CE

Before the Common Era and Common Era. They count the same years as BC and AD; BCE years count down toward 1.

c. means circa

About. Dates marked c. are approximate, usually from archaeology or later records. On the timeline their bars are hatched.

Traditional dates

Some dates, such as the founding of the Roman Republic in 509 BCE, come from ancient tradition rather than records. The timeline marks them.

What this resource is

Dates stick when you can see them next to each other: the Han dynasty and the Roman Empire at the same time, Mali at its height while Europe recovered from plague. This timeline keeps every region in view and quizzes you until the order is automatic.

Part of Academics · Study Skills in the Caveat Suite

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Outcome
A zoomable world history timeline of 95 events and eras from about 3200 BCE to 2020, with region and theme filters, a list view, and a study mode that quizzes the order and dates of events.
Who it is for
High school students in world history (including AP World History), and the tutors and families who help them review.
Format
A browser tool with a timeline, a list view and study rounds. Print a chronology or download the events as a spreadsheet.
Access
Free. No account, no sign-up. Your score and review list stay in this browser.
Time
About 15 minutes to explore one era and play a few study rounds.
Space
Academics · Study Skills primary space
Support
Questions or a problem with this tool: team@caveatacademic.com

Sources

  • Encyclopaedia Britannica articles for each event, used to check dates (Nov 2026): britannica.com
  • Norse presence at L'Anse aux Meadows in 1021 CE: Kuitems and others, "Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021," Nature 601 (2022): nature.com
  • Scale of the trans-Atlantic slave trade: SlaveVoyages, Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database: slavevoyages.org

95 events chosen to cover every region and theme; no timeline is complete. Approximate dates (c.) are those historians give as ranges; we show a commonly cited year. Descriptions are written by Caveat Academic Services.