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Outbyte PC Repair FREEClear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsFree Scan →Outbyte Driver Updater FREEScan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →A 2023 report ranked Elon Musk below Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos in an analysis of executives’ public speaking. It did not report IQ-test results: Preply’s scores came from language-model analysis of selected speeches, not a standardized intelligence exam. The distinction matters because the ranking can describe how these executives’ sampled remarks scored under one framework, but it cannot establish who has the higher IQ or is generally more intelligent.
What did the 2023 report say about Musk, Zuckerberg and Bezos?
TechTimes reported on October 5, 2023, that Musk scored 64 and placed 16th among the tech CEOs assessed. Zuckerberg scored 69.67 and ranked eighth. The report also said Bezos ranked above Musk, but did not state Bezos’s numerical score in its text. Those figures are the results attributed to Preply’s speech-analysis exercise in that 2023 account, not verified IQ scores. TechTimes’ October 2023 report
| Executive | 2023 score reported by TechTimes | 2023 position reported by TechTimes |
|---|---|---|
| Mark Zuckerberg | 69.67 | 8th |
| Jeff Bezos | Not stated in the TechTimes report | Above Musk; exact position not stated in the report |
| Elon Musk | 64 | 16th among the tech CEOs assessed |
The comparison therefore supports a narrow statement: in the 2023 account of Preply’s analysis, Zuckerberg scored above Musk, and Bezos was reported as ranking above Musk. It does not provide a complete numerical comparison for all three.
What did Preply’s analysis actually measure?
Preply says it selected active CEOs of the 100 U.S. companies with the largest market capitalization, then added 26 executives it considered relevant, including Bezos, who was no longer Amazon’s CEO, and Sam Altman. It says ten CEOs were excluded because there was not enough public-speaking data. For each executive, the company collected transcripts from at least three public-speaking engagements totaling at least one hour; it reports analyzing an average of 2.25 hours of speech per executive. Preply’s methodology and CEO ranking page
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The company says large language models assessed speech characteristics and that it averaged those characteristic scores into a general score. Its stated dimensions include logical and mathematical reasoning, abstract and conceptual thinking, memory and recall, verbal ability, creativity, logical flow, analytical acumen, vocabulary breadth, eloquence and creative problem-solving. TechTimes summarized its account of the evaluated traits as critical thinking, contextual relevance, vocabulary breadth, sophistication, readability and depth of ideas.
That is a judgment about selected public speech under a company-designed rubric. It is not a report of Musk, Zuckerberg or Bezos taking a standardized, professionally administered IQ test. A speech sample may reflect communication style and the particular material selected, among other things; the score should not be treated as a direct measurement of a person’s overall cognitive ability.
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Why do Preply’s later figures differ?
Preply’s ranking page was updated on May 14, 2025, and describes a later version of the ranking. In that version, Jensen Huang led with 81.25, while Zuckerberg’s score was 54.83; the page also placed Sam Altman and Satya Nadella above both Musk and Zuckerberg. The 2025 Zuckerberg figure differs from the 69.67 reported in the 2023 TechTimes story. The pages describe different versions and dates, so their values should not be combined as though they were one unchanged leaderboard.
Accordingly, any reference to Zuckerberg’s 69.67 or Musk’s 64 should be labeled as the comparison reported in 2023. The later page is evidence that Preply’s published ranking and scores changed; it does not turn either version into an IQ assessment.
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Does this establish who is smarter?
No. The ranking does not establish a verified IQ ordering among Musk, Zuckerberg and Bezos. The available comparison is limited to speech-analysis scores, and the TechTimes text does not provide a Bezos score. There is no basis in these figures to infer who would score highest on a common intelligence test, much less to declare who is objectively smarter overall.
Other claims sometimes used to compare prominent people answer different questions. A 2014 study by Jonathan Wai examined groups of global elites using proxies such as attendance at elite schools and schools’ average standardized-test scores; it did not provide individual IQ results for these three executives. Wai wrote, “Ultimately, the method cannot disentangle education from cognitive ability.” Wai’s 2014 study
Separately, a 2021 Journal of School Psychology study compared seven intelligence tests among participants aged 4–20 and found that exact IQ-score interpretations and confidence intervals could not be reliably replicated across tests. That is a general caution about test comparability, not a test of adult executives or Preply’s speech-analysis model. The 2021 test-comparability study
Psychometrician Russell T. Warne wrote in 2025 that there is no credible public record of Musk taking a professionally administered IQ test. Warne discusses SAT scores reported in Walter Isaacson’s biography to derive estimates; those are converted estimates, not an administered IQ result. This commentary does not establish test results for Zuckerberg or Bezos. Warne’s 2025 discussion of Musk IQ estimates
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How to read the headline accurately
- “Musk scored 64” means the 2023 TechTimes report attributed that score to Preply’s analysis of sampled speech.
- “Zuckerberg scored higher” is true only of the stated 2023 comparison: 69.67 versus Musk’s 64.
- “Bezos ranked above Musk” is what the 2023 report says; it does not supply Bezos’s numerical score in its text.
- “Musk’s IQ is 64” is not supported. The score is not identified as an IQ result, and the cited comparison does not document a common exam taken by the three executives.
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