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Heinrich Hertz: Making the Waves, and Seeing No Use for Them

By Infinite Creation · Profile

Historical photograph of Heinrich Hertz.

At a Glance

Heinrich Rudolf Hertz (1857-1894) generated and detected electromagnetic waves in 1887, confirming James Clerk Maxwell's theoretical prediction that light and radio are the same phenomenon at different frequencies. He showed the waves could be reflected, refracted and polarised like light. He saw no practical application and died at 36.

Lived: 1857-1894, Germany
Anchor year: 1887, electromagnetic waves demonstrated
Strand: canon

Career

The problem as it stood

Maxwell had predicted in the 1860s that changing electric and magnetic fields propagate as waves at the speed of light. It was mathematics without an experiment. Nobody had produced or detected such a wave deliberately.

What he actually did

Hertz built a spark-gap transmitter, an induction coil driving two spheres across a gap, and a receiver consisting of a loop of wire with a tiny gap in it. When the transmitter sparked, a minute spark appeared across the receiver gap metres away, with no connection between them.

How it worked

The oscillating discharge radiates energy at radio frequency. The receiving loop acts as an antenna, and the induced voltage is enough to jump its gap. Hertz went further, using reflectors and prisms to show the waves behave exactly like light, which is what made the result a confirmation of Maxwell rather than a curiosity.

What it made possible

Everything wireless. Within a decade Branly, Lodge, Popov, Bose and Marconi were all building on it, and the waves themselves were called Hertzian waves for a generation. The unit of frequency bears his name.

What happened to him

He died in 1894 at 36 of a vascular condition, before any practical wireless system existed. Asked about applications, he is reported to have said there were none. "just something the Maestro Maxwell was right about."

Where the credit landed

Hertz is properly credited and rarely disputed, which makes him the fixed point in radio's otherwise contested origin story. No single person invented radio. Hertz demonstrated electromagnetic waves. Branly, Lodge, Popov and Bose developed detection. Tesla and Lodge established tuned circuits. Marconi built the first working long-distance wireless service and the first commercial business around it. Priority claims have been advanced for all of them, often along national lines, and courts have ruled on patents rather than on invention.

Known For

Hertz confirmed Maxwell, the theory came first.
He explicitly saw no practical use for the waves.
He is the one uncontested figure in radio's origin.

Knowledge Base

What You'll Learn

Radio begins as a mathematical prediction that somebody bothered to test.

Why "same as light" is the important part

Hertz did not merely detect something at a distance. By reflecting, refracting and polarising the waves he showed they obey the laws of optics, establishing that radio, infrared, visible light and X-rays are one phenomenon across a spectrum. That is why antenna design uses optical reasoning, why directional aerials work like mirrors and lenses, and why the Yagi-Uda has reflectors and directors.

Where This Fits

Hertz proved the waves every transmitter uses, the physics under the middle link of A History of Broadcast Technology.

FAQ

Q: Did Hertz invent radio?
A: No. He demonstrated that electromagnetic waves exist and behave like light, confirming Maxwell. He saw no practical application. No single person invented radio. Hertz demonstrated electromagnetic waves. Branly, Lodge, Popov and Bose developed detection. Tesla and Lodge established tuned circuits. Marconi built the first working long-distance wireless service and the first commercial business around it. Priority claims have been advanced for all of them, often along national lines, and courts have ruled on patents rather than on invention.

Q: Why is frequency measured in hertz?
A: The unit was named in his honour in 1930. One hertz is one cycle per second.

Sources

Both papers were checked against their publication records. Checked 20 August 2026.

H. Hertz, Ueber sehr schnelle electrische Schwingungen. Annalen der Physik, volume 267, issue 7, pages 421 to 448, 1887. Hertz reporting the oscillations himself, sole author. This is the publication the 1887 anchor year above refers to.
H. Hertz, Ueber electrodynamische Wellen im Luftraume und deren Reflexion. Annalen der Physik, volume 270, issue 8A, pages 609 to 623, 1888. The follow up paper on waves in open air and their reflection, which is the behaviour described above.