The High Luminosity Large Hadron Collider will provide a tenfold increase in particle collisions compared with the initial LHC infrastructure by increasing the number of ions in collision bundles and by concentrating the ion beams.

Learn about five of the largest particle accelerators on Earth, which, as of 2026, are led by the Large Hadron Collider at the European Organization for Nuclear Research.

At the Large Hadron Collider, protons are accelerated so close to the speed of light that they would lag behind a laser by just 10 feet after 14 minutes of travel.

Although built from 1996 to 2008, the Large Hadron Collider relies on accelerators built starting in 1954 to help bring protons to 99.9999991% the speed of light—about 2.73 million football fields per second.

Despite fears of creating black holes, the Large Hadron Collider produces collisions with energies of 13.6 trillion electronvolts, about one million times smaller than the energy needed to create the lightest possible black holes.

Watch an animated visualization of how the Large Hadron Collider works, including how particles are accelerated through a series of machines and how collision data is collected and distributed worldwide.

As of 2026, 75 of the 86 particles discovered by the Large Hadron Collider have been found by the LHCb experiment—a detector that explores the decay of particles made of beauty and charm quarks.

Particle accelerators propel matter toward small targets at high speed

Devices like cathode-ray tube televisions were once basic particle accelerators, but modern ones, such as the Large Hadron Collider, use massive magnetic fields and circular tunnels to achieve energies high enough to recreate the conditions just after the big bang.

At the Large Hadron Collider, scientists have transformed lead into gold—a process known as chrysopoeia, which alchemists sought for centuries.

If particle accelerators did create black holes by packing tremendous energy into a small volume, then trillions would be created in Earth's atmosphere daily by cosmic rays.

Each year, the Large Hadron Collider undergoes a winter shutdown—when electricity costs are highest—and bringing it back online requires weeks of tests, including some involving high-energy particles from outer space.

The Large Hadron Collider is the world's largest cryogenic system, which uses 10,000 metric tons of liquid nitrogen and 120 metric tons of helium to cool 36,000 metric tons of magnets to temperatures colder than outer space.

Through 2038, the Large Hadron Collider research program is expected to generate societal benefits of €25.6B, or €3.3B more than operating costs and investments.

The Large Hadron Collider repurposed an excavation tunnel built for the Large Electron-Positron Collider, which was used until 2000 and whose construction involved the largest civil engineering project in Europe before the Channel Tunnel.

CERN—the European Organization for Nuclear Research—is the world's largest particle physics laboratory, with the Large Hadron Collider serving as its largest tool.

At the CERN Control Center, where the Large Hadron Collider and connected accelerators are managed, champagne bottles from parties commemorating major milestones, such as the first collisions or a new record energy, are collected.

On average, the Large Hadron Collider uses 1.3 terawatt-hours of electricity annually—equivalent to about 124,000 US homes—generated by a French substation.

Take a 360-degree tour of ATLAS, one of two general-purpose detectors at the Large Hadron Collider and the largest particle detector by volume ever built. (VR device-compatible)

The Worldwide LHC Computing Grid—a distributed system of 2 billion gigabytes of storage across over 40 countries—manages data produced by the Large Hadron Collider.

Before 1932, when particle accelerators were first used for nuclear research, scientists relied on naturally radioactive substances to advance their understanding of the atomic nucleus.

The first circular particle accelerator was narrower than the average cereal bowl

The 1939 Nobel Prize in physics was awarded to Ernest Lawrence for inventing the cyclotron. By comparison, the Large Hadron Collider is 5 miles in diameter and is the largest cryogenic system in the world, cooling its electromagnets to temperatures colder than those found in outer space.

Explaining the Higgs boson, also known as the 'God Particle'

The Higgs boson is a long sought after fundamental particle that—within the framework of high-energy physics—gives other particles their mass. Having captured public attention when it was discovered in 2012 at the Large Hadron Collider, and its...

The Higgs boson is a quanta, or discrete piece, of the Higgs field, which gives elementary particles, such as quarks and electrons, mass as they travel through it.

It may be possible to create dark matter in particle accelerators

In high-energy collisions, exotic forms of matter can be produced by directly converting energy into mass according to *E = mc*². Even though a dark matter particle would not be directly observable, its creation would result in unaccounted-for mass, which can be compared to potential dark matter candidates for indirect detection.

Some cosmic rays possess energies as high as 100,000,000 teraelectron volts—more than 10 million times the energy of particles accelerated in the Large Hadron Collider.

Unlike the other major detectors at the Large Hadron Collider, the Compact Muon Solenoid—one of two general-purpose detectors—was built above ground and then lowered underground in sections for reassembly.

The total length of superconducting wire at the Large Hadron Collider spans about 250,000 kilometers (155,000 miles)—enough to wrap around the equator 6.2 times.

At CERN's Antimatter Factory, researchers create and guide antiprotons and antielectrons together to form antihydrogen, and all these antiparticles are analyzed to help scientists study the behavior of antimatter.

Within ALICE—A Large Ion Collider Experiment—at the Large Hadron Collider, scientists have created quark-gluon plasma—an exotic form of matter present in the moments after the Big Bang.

As of 2023, the world's smallest particle accelerator is smaller than a penny

The prototype is an example of a photonic accelerator, which utilizes tiny lasers to accelerate electrons rather than relying on oscillating electromagnetic fields to move them. It can deliver about 1 electron per second with energies equivalent to those found in cathode-ray tube televisions.

Particle accelerators detect subatomic particles using millions of sensors

Calorimeters measure the energy of particles. Tracking devices can measure momentum and charge from the trajectory of particles, which is determined by recording tiny electrical signals. Time-of-flight detectors provide particle velocities directly and particle mass indirectly, giving physicists a suite of properties to compare with those of known matter.

Explore the components of the linear particle accelerator at Los Alamos

Located at the site of bomb design and development for the Manhattan Project, LANSCE features an injector system for hydrogen ions, a series of tanks with alternating electric fields for proton acceleration, and an isotope production facility that creates radioisotopes for medical treatments.

As of 2025, LUX-ZEPLIN is the world's most sensitive dark matter experiment, which is designed to indirectly detect a potential candidate for the invisible form of matter.

View a timeline of particle discoveries through the Higgs boson in 2012

With few exceptions, the elementary particles that make up the Standard Model were theorized or predicted to exist before their eventual discovery in high-energy environments. These predictions were often the result of inferences drawn from already accepted mathematical models.

The most common type of particle accelerator is a linear electron accelerator, which fires particles in a straight line, making them useful for the intense, targeted beams needed in cancer treatment.

Antimatter particles possess the same mass and spin as their normal particle counterparts, but possess an opposite charge and transform into pure energy upon colliding with normal matter.

Particle interactions follow rules related to specific quantum properties

Like a business whose purchased inventory matches sold inventory, physicists identified specific patterns across decades of particle accelerator data, which became new conservation laws for elementary particles. These laws help identify which particle decays are expected or forbidden.