Based on the criteria and reliable sources that confirm giants, Robert Wadlow of the United States (1918–1940) was the tallest person in the world. He was 8 ft 11.1 in (272 cm). Observing how tall some people can grow to be is truly remarkable. A list of the tallest people in history has been compiled. From 1835 to the present day, this article features a list of the top 20 tallest people, both alive and dead, along with their respective heights.
20/20 Naseer Soomro – 7 ft, 10in (2.38m)
Soomro is from Pakistan. He is one of the tallest people who live there. He is 238 cm (7 ft. 10 in.) tall, which makes him one of the tallest people alive today. Not only is Soomro tall, but he is also very smart and skilled. He is an Engineer with a bachelor’s degree in metallurgy, but that’s not all. Soomro loves to write poetry and stories, and he works hard to do so. He is well-known as a poet in the country. He writes beautiful pieces in Urdu and Sindhi and has written five books of poetry so far.
19/20 Brahim Takioullah – 8 ft, 1in (2.46m)
This man comes from the rich land of Guelmim, Morocco, and is known for being 246 cm tall (8 ft. 1 in.). Takioullah is currently a French citizen and works at “Saint-Paul,” an amusement park just outside Beauvais, a city about 80 km north of Paris.
People were worried about him because he had a growth spurt when he should have been 13 years old. At age 18, a tumor in his brain that made hormones was found. He had surgery, and the surgeon was able to remove the tumor. After that, the hormone levels in his blood came back to normal.
18/20 Zeng Jinlian – 8 ft, 2in (2.48m)
Zeng Jinlian was born in China on June 26, 1964, in the village of Yujiang in the Bright Moon Commune in the province of Hunan. She started growing too fast when she was four months old. By the time she was four, she was 156 cm (5 ft 1 1/2 in) tall, and by the time she was 13, she was 217 cm (7 ft 1 1/2 in).
The length of her hands is 25.5 cm (10 in), and the length of her feet is 35.5 cm (14 in). Both scoliosis and diabetes made her sick. When she died on February 13, 1982, she was 246.3 cm (8.1 ft) tall.
17/20 Don Koehler – 8 ft, 2in (2.48m)
Don Koehler was born on September 1, 1925, and died on February 26, 1981. Koehler and his family lived on the north side of Chicago when he was young. He went to Amundsen High School. Because of a medical condition called gigantism, Koehler was once 8 ft 2 in (249 cm) tall.
Later in life, he had a medical condition called kyphosis, which caused his spine to curve (often severely). In 1981, Koehler died in Chicago from a heart condition. At the time, he was about 7 feet 10 inches (239 cm) tall. He had turned 55.
16/20 Bernard Coyne – 8 ft, 2in (2.48m)
Bernard A. Coyne lived from July 27, 1897, to May 20, 1921. He was one of few people in the history of medicine who were at least 8 feet (240 cm) tall. At the time of his death in 1921, Coyne may have been 8 feet 4 inches (2.54 m) tall.
He was the tallest person in the world when he died, even though he was still growing like Robert Wadlow. Bernard Coyne died in 1921. He is buried in Anthon, Iowa, in an extra-large coffin that was made just for him.
15/20 Jinnat Ali – 8 ft, 2in (2.48m)
Jinnat Ali was born in 1996 in Bangladesh, in the village of Barabili in the Gorjania union under the Ramu Upazila. Ali’s body started to grow in a strange way all of a sudden when he was a child. At age 23, his body was still getting bigger.
His height was measured to be 8ft, 2 in. Ali got help at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University in Dhaka for his hormonal imbalance. Jinnat Ali died on April 28, 2020, while on life support in the neurosurgery department of Chittagong Medical College Hospital because of a brain tumor and other problems.
14/20 Sultan Kösen – 8 ft, 2.8in (2.51m)
Kosen comes from a Kurdish family in Turkey. He is the tallest person alive today, according to the Guinness World Records. Since September 2009, when he was 246 cm (8 ft. 1 in.) tall, he has held the record. As of 2011, the height is 251 cm (8 ft. 2.8 in.).
Kosen’s unusual height and huge growth are caused by pituitary gigantism. Kosen works as a farmer, but he has also been in the Magic Circus of Samoa and several other shows around the world.
13/20 Vikas Uppal – 8 ft, 3in (2.51m)
Vikas Kumar “Vicky” Uppal was born in India on January 1, 1986, and died on June 30, 2007. Vicky Uppal was from the Indian state of Haryana, in the area called Rohtak. He was said to be the tallest man in India.
He was in his late teens in 2004 when The Tribune said he was 2.51 m (8 ft 3 in) tall and still growing. In September 2006, he was photographed for The Hindu at a rally for the Indian National Lok Dal. He was also in the movie Rang De Basanti, which was made in India.
12/20 Edouard Beaupré – 8 ft, 3in (2.51m)
Édouard Beaupré was a Canadian circus and freak show giant, pro wrestler, strongman, and star of Barnum and Bailey’s circus. He was born on January 9, 1881, and died on July 3, 1904. He was one of the tallest men in history. He was said to be 2.51 m tall (8 ft 3 in).
He was a great horseman, but by the time he was 17, he was 2.21 m (7 ft 3 in) tall and had to give up the job. He died on July 3, 1904, from pulmonary hemorrhage, a complication of tuberculosis. He was 23 years old.
11/20 Väinö Myllyrinne – 8 ft, 3in (2.51m)
Vaino Myllyrinne was born 27 February 1909 and died on 13 April 1963). Myllyrinne was born in Helsinki, Grand Duchy of Finland. He served in the Finnish Defense Forces and is thought to be the tallest soldier ever. At age 21, he was 224 cm (7 ft 4 in) tall and weighed 141 kg (311 lbs). In his late 30s, he went through a second growth spurt and reached a height of 251 cm (8 ft 3 in).
Doctors measured him at 2.48 m (8 ft 1.5 in) in 1962, just one year before he died. He had the widest hand span known, which was 290 mm (11.4 in).
10/20 Trijntje Keever – 8 ft, 4in (2.54m)
In April 1616, Keever was born in the small town of Edam in the Northwest. Trijntje Keever was the fifth tallest person in history and the tallest woman who ever lived.
On the day she died, she was 8 feet, 4 inches, or 2.54 meters tall. Due to how quickly she grew, Keever became a big deal very quickly in her life. Even foreign kings and queens, like Frederick the V., King of Bohemia, came to see Keever. But cancer cut short her life too soon. Trijntje Keever died on July 2, 1633. She was only 17.
9/20 Hồ Văn Trung – 8 ft, 4.5in (2.55m)
Ho Van Trung was born in Cao Mau, Vietnam, in 1984 or 1985. Before Trung turned 17, he was a normal height. A few months after he turned 17, he got Malaria. After he got better, he kept getting taller and heavier.
In May 2019, he was 8 feet, 4.5 inches tall (255cm). Trung had to spend more than a year in the hospital. In just one week, he grew more than 3 inches (8 cm), which even his doctors noticed. He had colon surgery in late October 2019 to cure his disease. Inflammatory bowel disease caused Trung to die in November 2019, just a week after he had surgery.
8/20 Julius Koch – 8 ft, 4.8in (2.55m)
Julius Koch, who lived from 1872 to 1902, was one of the tallest people who have ever lived. He had gigantism, which caused his pituitary gland to get bigger, his testicles to shrink, and his sexual development to stop. He also had trouble walking.
He was said to be 2.59 m (8 ft 6 in) tall, but since the skeleton is only 8 ft 1 in tall, this was thought to be an exaggeration (2.46 cm). Koch was the main character in an early short movie that came out in 1902. Koch died in Mons, Belgium, on 30 March 1902. His skeleton is kept at the Natural History Museum in Mons, Belgium.
7/20 Leonid Stadnyk – 8 ft, 5in (2.56m)
Leonid Stadnyk was born in a small village in northern Ukraine near the city of Zhytomyr on August 5, 1970. Stadnyk had a height of 8 ft, 5 in (2.56 meters). His growth spurt began after he underwent needed brain surgery at the age of 13. After the operation, a tumor formed in the patient’s brain and began producing excessive amounts of growth hormone.
Fortunately, Stadnyk’s tumor turned out to be benign, but it did cause him to grow at an abnormally rapid rate. Stadnyk passed away on August 24, 2014, after suffering a sudden brain hemorrhage at the age of 44.
6/20 Al Tomaini – 8 ft, 5.5in (2.57m)
Aurelio “Al” Tomaini, who was born on February 25, 1912, and died on August 30, 1962, was once the tallest person in the world. Tomaini said he was 8 feet, 5.5 inches tall. His parents went to a doctor, who used X-rays to find that the reason he was so tall was that his pituitary gland was over-active.
Tomaini was part of a sideshow. In 1943, he met his future wife, Jeanie Smith at the Great Lakes Exposition in Cleveland. He was working in a circus there. He was 357 pounds and wore shoes with a size 26. He died in 1962.
5/20 Franz Winkelmeier – 8 ft, 6in (2.57m)
The Austrian man Franz Winkelmeier (27 April 1860–24 August 1887) was invoiced as the world’s tallest man due to his height of 8 feet, 6 inches (2.59 m). Giant Friedburg-Lengau was his nickname.
Franz Winkelmeier went to primary school in Friedburg. He was hired by R. Rosingky on November 9th, 1886, to travel to London. It was on June 22nd, 1887, that he was officially introduced to Queen Victoria. Unfortunately, Franz Winkelmeier succumbed to tuberculosis shortly after his tours concluded. He was laid to rest in Lengau’s cemetery.
4/20 Willie Camper – 8ft, 6in (2.59m)
Willie Camper (1924-1943) Guicel “Willie” Camper was a big guy and he was from Memphis. He was known as “Willie.” He is rumored to have reached a height of 8 feet 6 inches and weighed as much as 480 pounds, despite the fact that many people believe that his height was exaggerated. Camper suffered a heart attack in 1943 while he was performing, and he passed away at the age of 19 years old.
3/20 John Rogan – 8ft, 8in (2.64m)
The birth year of John William “Bud” Rogan is disputed among sources, but it occurred between 1867 and 1905. John Rogan was born in Tennessee, in the town of Hendersonville.
In 1899, his height was recorded at 8 ft, 6 in (2.59 m), and his weight was estimated to be between 175 and 205 lbs (79 and 95 kgs). Rogan had 11-inch (28 cm) hands and 13-inch (33 cm) feet. He was 8 ft, 8 in tall back then. He was the tallest person of African descent. In 1939, Robert Wadlow surpassed Rogan in height.
2/20 Pornchai Saosri – 8ft, 9.9in (2.69m)
Pornchai Saosri, a Thai man who lived from 1989 until his death on November 8, 2015, claimed to be 8 feet, 9.9 inches (2.69 meters) tall. This claim, however, has not been confirmed by Guinness World Records. In 2013, at the time of his id card renewal, he was measured and found to be 8 feet, 5.2 inches in height. The Guinness Book of Records now lists him as one of the world’s tallest people.
Due to his height and hypertension, Pornchai had endured a plethora of medical problems. In 2015, at the age of 26, he passed away from hypertension. At that point, he was said to be 8 ft 9.9 in (269 cm) tall and weigh 135 kg, which, if true, would make him the second tallest person ever recorded.
1/20 Robert Wadlow – 8ft, 11.1in (2.72m)
An American by the name of Robert Pershing Wadlow (February 22, 1918 – July 15, 1940) was better known as the Alton Giant or the Giant of Illinois. His childhood was spent in the midwestern city of Alton, Illinois, not far from St. Louis. Wadlow had poor sensation in his legs and feet and walked with the aid of braces. In his lifetime, he avoided ever needing a wheelchair.
At his death at the age of 22, Wadlow had reached a height of 8 feet, 11.1 inches (2.72 meters) and a weight of 439 pounds (199 kilograms). At the time of his death, there was no indication that his growth had ended. Even in his final days, he exhibited remarkable physical strength.
