Firsts and accidents
Myth-buster
'hello, world' predates C
Did you know 'hello, world' is older than C?
· 24-sec read
The first known 'hello, world' program is in Brian Kernighan's tutorial for B, the Bell Labs language that came just before C. When Dennis Ritchie put the tutorial online, he noted that as far as he and Brian could remember it contained the first instance of a 'Hello, world' program. Kernighan and Ritchie's 1978 book The C Programming Language made it the classic first program.
Popular version vs. what really happened
Popular version
Popular version: it started in the 1978 C book.
What really happened
Reality: it appears earlier, in Kernighan's B tutorial (Bell Labs, about 1972; published as a technical report in January 1973).
Why it matters
A tiny, runnable first example is the best onboarding; Kernighan's tutorial habit became an industry ritual.
Sources
High confidenceChecked October 20, 2026.