🐒

Sahelanthropus
tchadensis

Earliest Hominid

~7 Mya

Small brain
Chimp-like face
Walked upright?

🦴

Australopithecus
afarensis

"Lucy"

3.9–2.9 Mya

Bipedal walker
400–550 cc brain
Still climbed trees

🪨

Homo habilis

"Handy Man"

2.4–1.4 Mya

First stone tools
600–800 cc brain
Scavenging diet

🔥

Homo erectus

"Upright Man"

1.9 Mya–110 Kya

Controlled fire
900–1100 cc brain
Left Africa!

🏔️

Homo
neanderthalensis

Neanderthal

400–40 Kya

1400+ cc brain
Buried their dead
Interbred w/ sapiens

🧑

Homo sapiens

Modern Human

~300 Kya–Now

1300–1500 cc brain
Art, language
Global spread

⟶ INCREASING BRAIN SIZE · TOOL USE · SOCIAL COMPLEXITY ⟶

Brain volume nearly tripled — from ~400 cc in Australopithecus to ~1,400 cc in modern humans over 4 million years.

Walking upright evolved millions of years BEFORE big brains — it freed our hands for tool use.

From simple Oldowan flakes (2.6 Mya) → Acheulean hand axes → complex blades and eventually writing.

Homo erectus was the first to leave Africa (~1.9 Mya). Modern humans followed in a second wave ~70,000 years ago.

🦴 Human Evolution