Can giraffes do math? The world’s tallest mammals are better at addition than subtraction, scientists discover in surprising math study

Giraffes are famous for their extraordinary height, but a new study suggests their impressive brains may be just as remarkable. Researchers have found that some giraffes can mentally combine quantities—a math-like ability that could represent one of the building blocks of numerical thinking, reported National Geographic.

The study, published in Scientific Reports, was conducted by scientists from the University of Barcelona and tested four giraffes at the Barcelona Zoo using a series of carrot-based experiments. Two of the four animals consistently demonstrated the ability to remember and mentally combine quantities to identify which container held more food.

According to the researchers, giraffes appear to outperform several other animals, including horses, dogs and zebrafish, in similar quantity-manipulation tasks.


Read full study here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-026-54126-7

A carrot test for mental addition

The experiment revolved around one of the giraffes' favourite foods: carrots.

Researchers placed small numbers of carrot pieces into two yellow containers while the giraffe watched. They then showed a green container holding additional carrots before secretly transferring its contents into one of the yellow containers through a hidden opening.

The giraffe's task was to determine which yellow container now contained the larger quantity of carrots—even though the food was no longer visible.

In one trial, a female giraffe named Nuru watched as one container held two carrots and the other held three. The green container contained two more carrots, which were added to the first container. Nuru correctly chose the first container, effectively recognising that 2 + 2 is greater than 3.

To solve the task, the giraffes had to remember the original quantities and mentally combine them before making a choice.

Not every giraffe passed

The team repeated the experiments hundreds of times with all four giraffes.

Two animals—Nuru and a male named Njano—consistently succeeded in the tests. The remaining two appeared to rely on a shortcut, choosing the correct container only when it happened to be the one most recently handled by the researcher.

Scientists are unsure whether this reflects genuine differences in numerical ability or simply different learning strategies developed in captivity.

Better with addition than subtraction

Researchers also tested whether giraffes could perform subtraction-like tasks by mentally removing quantities, as well as more complex problems combining both addition and subtraction.

The giraffes did not succeed in these experiments, suggesting that subtraction-like operations are considerably more difficult than addition-like ones.