Reference · World Records & Superlatives
Bee World
Records
The largest, smallest, fastest, oldest, most venomous, most productive, most traveled, and otherwise most remarkable bees and bee-related facts ever documented. Verified where possible. Astonishing regardless.
38mm
Largest Bee on Earth
Wallace's Giant Bee · Megachile pluto
3,000+
Oldest Edible Honey
Years · Egyptian tomb excavation
55,000
Miles Flown Per Pound
Collective distance for 1 lb of honey
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Size & Physical Records
| Record |
Value |
Details |
Source |
| Largest bee species |
38mm |
Wallace's Giant Bee (Megachile pluto), found in Indonesia. About the size of a human thumb. Lost to science for 38 years, rediscovered in 2019 on a single island in North Maluku. |
Natural History Museum |
| Smallest bee species |
2mm |
Perdita minima, a mining bee native to the American Southwest. So small it can fit on a pencil tip. Makes nests in bare sandy soil. |
USGS Bee Lab |
| Largest colony |
~80,000 |
Peak summer population of a healthy Western honeybee (Apis mellifera) hive. Most colonies range 20,000–60,000 workers depending on season and health. |
Beekeeping literature |
| Longest proboscis |
~20mm |
Eulaema (orchid bees) possess exceptionally long tongues relative to body size, enabling access to deep tubular flowers inaccessible to other bees. |
Entomological records |
| Heaviest bee |
~2.7g |
Carpenter bees (Xylocopa) are among the heaviest, with some tropical species reaching nearly 3 grams — heavier than a US penny. |
Field measurements |
🏆 Notable Record
Wallace's Giant Bee was named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first collected a specimen in 1858. He described it as "a large black wasp-like insect." It was not seen again by scientists until 1981, and not photographed alive until 2019.
Speed & Flight Records
| Record | Value | Details | Source |
|---|
| Top flight speed |
15 mph |
Western honeybee top speed. Average foraging speed is closer to 15 mph; when returning to the hive loaded with nectar, bees slow to about 12 mph. |
USDA research |
| Wingbeat frequency |
230 Hz |
Honeybee wings beat approximately 230 times per second, producing the characteristic buzz. Bumblebees beat at a lower frequency — around 130–180 Hz — but generate more force. |
Aerodynamic studies |
| Buzz pollination frequency |
400 Hz |
Bumblebees performing sonication (buzz pollination) vibrate their thoracic muscles at up to 400 Hz — nearly twice their wing frequency — to shake pollen from flowers. |
University of Stirling |
| Foraging range |
5+ miles |
Honeybees can forage up to 5 miles from the hive, though most foraging occurs within 1–2 miles. In extreme circumstances, ranges up to 8 miles have been documented. |
Cornell University |
| Distance flown per pound of honey |
55,000 miles |
The collective flying distance of all bees required to produce one pound of honey. Equivalent to flying around the Earth more than twice. |
National Honey Board |
Honey Records
| Record | Value | Details | Source |
|---|
| Oldest edible honey |
3,000+ years |
Honey found in Egyptian tombs dating to approximately 1000 BCE has been tasted by archaeologists and declared still edible. Low water content and hydrogen peroxide make honey functionally immortal. |
Archaeological excavations |
| Most expensive honey |
$6,800/kg |
Elvish honey from Turkey, harvested from a cave 1,800 meters underground where wild bees nest in mineral-rich rock formations. Collected once per year by a single harvester on a rope. |
Guinness / market records |
| Honey per worker bee (lifetime) |
1/12 teaspoon |
A single honeybee produces approximately 1/12th of a teaspoon of honey during its entire 6-week summer lifespan. It takes the lifetime work of 556 bees to fill one jar. |
National Honey Board |
| Highest honey production (country) |
~500,000 tons/yr |
China produces approximately half of the world's honey supply annually, followed by Turkey, Argentina, Ukraine, and the United States. |
FAO 2023 |
| Largest honey bee colony ever kept |
~100,000 |
Exceptionally managed commercial hives, particularly in southern climates with year-round nectar flow, have been documented sustaining populations approaching 100,000 workers. |
Commercial beekeeping records |
| Flowers visited per foraging trip |
50–100 |
A single worker bee visits between 50 and 100 flowers per foraging trip. Over its lifetime, a bee will visit approximately 2 million flowers to produce its 1/12 teaspoon of honey. |
USDA research |
🏆 Notable Record
Elvish honey from Turkey is so rare and expensive that the beekeeper, İbrahim Sedef, uses a rope system to descend into a 1,800-meter cave to collect it. He harvests roughly 180kg per year. At $6,800 per kilogram, this represents the most expensive honey commercially available on Earth.
Productivity & Biological Records
| Record | Value | Details | Source |
|---|
| Eggs laid per day (queen) |
2,000 |
A peak-laying honeybee queen can deposit up to 2,000 eggs per day during summer — more than her own body weight daily. She can lay fertilized (worker) or unfertilized (drone) eggs at will. |
Beekeeping literature |
| Longest queen lifespan |
7–8 years |
While average queen lifespan is 3–5 years, exceptional queens in the German honeybee subspecies (A. m. mellifera) have been documented living up to 8 years. |
European beekeeping records |
| Shortest adult bee lifespan |
~6 weeks |
Summer worker honeybees live approximately 6 weeks from emergence to death, worn out by foraging. Winter workers, who conserve energy by clustering, can live 4–6 months. |
Entomological studies |
| Oldest known bee (fossil) |
100 million years |
The oldest confirmed bee fossil, Cretotrigona prisca, was found preserved in Burmese amber dating to approximately 100 million years ago (Cretaceous period). |
American Museum of Natural History |
| Pollination efficiency vs honeybees |
100:1 |
A single mason bee (Osmia) pollinates as effectively as approximately 100 honeybees. Their dry pollen-carrying method (vs. honeybee wet pollen baskets) makes them dramatically messier and more effective. |
Oregon State University |
| Largest number of bee species (country) |
~4,000 spp. |
The United States hosts approximately 4,000 native bee species — more than any other single country — ranging from the deserts of the Southwest to the forests of the Pacific Northwest. |
USGS Bee Lab |
Agricultural & Economic Records
| Record | Value | Details | Source |
|---|
| Global pollination value |
$577 billion/yr |
Annual economic value of insect pollination services globally, the majority provided by bees. Represents the food production that would be lost without pollinators. |
IPBES 2019 |
| US crop pollination value |
$15 billion/yr |
Annual value of honeybee pollination to US agriculture alone. Almonds are the single largest dependent crop, requiring approximately 1.5 million colonies per season. |
USDA 2023 |
| Largest annual bee migration |
~1.5M colonies |
California's almond bloom requires the transport of approximately 1.5 million honeybee colonies from across the US every February — the largest managed pollination event on Earth. |
Almond Board of California |
| Most bee-dependent crop |
Almonds (100%) |
Almonds are 100% dependent on bee pollination for commercial production. Without bees, the entire US almond industry — worth ~$5 billion annually — would cease to exist. |
USDA |
| Highest colony losses (single year) |
~45% (US, 2022–23) |
US beekeepers lost approximately 45% of managed honeybee colonies in the 2022–23 season — the highest annual loss rate on record. |
BIP Annual Survey |
Venom & Defense Records
| Record | Value | Details | Source |
|---|
| Most venomous bee |
Africanized honeybee |
Africanized honeybees (a hybrid of Apis mellifera scutellata) are not more toxic per sting than European honeybees, but defend aggressively in numbers 10–15x larger, delivering far more total venom. |
Toxicological literature |
| Stings to kill an adult human |
~1,000–1,500 |
Estimated number of simultaneous stings required to deliver a lethal venom dose to a non-allergic adult human. Individual bee venom is surprisingly mild; quantity is the danger. |
Medical toxicology |
| Bees with no functional sting |
~550 species |
The Meliponini tribe (stingless bees) comprises approximately 550 species that have evolved non-functional stingers. They defend hives using biting, propolis, and resin traps. |
Entomological records |
| Largest bee swarm recorded |
~80,000 bees |
Swarms containing up to 80,000 bees have been documented, though typical swarms number 5,000–20,000. Swarms are generally non-aggressive as bees have no hive to defend. |
Beekeeping records |
🐝 Worth Noting
Despite their reputation, bees kill far fewer people annually than cows, deer, or even vending machines. In the United States, bee and wasp stings cause approximately 60–70 deaths per year, almost exclusively due to allergic anaphylaxis rather than venom volume.
Miscellaneous & Unexpected Records
| Record | Value | Details | Source |
|---|
| Most bee species in a single genus |
~1,500 (Megachile) |
The genus Megachile (leafcutter bees) contains approximately 1,500 species — more than any other bee genus. They are found on every continent except Antarctica. |
Taxonomic records |
| Highest altitude bee documented |
~5,600m |
Bumblebees have been documented foraging at altitudes exceeding 5,600 meters (18,000 feet) in the Himalayas — higher than many aircraft fly commercially. |
Alpine entomology studies |
| Bee in space |
1984 |
Honeybees flew aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1984 (mission STS-41-C) as part of an experiment studying comb construction in microgravity. They built comb, though less efficiently than on Earth. |
NASA records |
| Largest bee festival |
~20,000 attendees |
The National Honey Bee Day, observed annually in August, draws events across the US with some regional festivals attracting tens of thousands of visitors. |
Event records |
| Most honey varieties catalogued |
300+ |
Over 300 distinct honey varieties have been catalogued worldwide, differentiated by floral source, color, flavor profile, and regional origin. Manuka, Tupelo, Buckwheat, and Acacia are among the most prized. |
Honey certification bodies |
| Fastest bee population collapse |
~30% in 3 months |
Colony Collapse Disorder events have documented losses of 30–90% of worker bees within a single season, with the cause (multiple interacting factors) still not fully resolved. |
USDA / EPA joint report |
| Longest uninterrupted bee fossil record |
130 million years |
The bee fossil record extends to approximately 130 million years ago, predating flowering plants in some interpretations. Bees co-evolved with angiosperms in one of biology's great partnerships. |
Paleontological literature |
| Most bee species named after celebrities |
Several dozen |
Bee taxonomists have named species after David Bowie (Euglossa bazinga — actually a bee), Beyoncé (Scaptia beyonceae, a horse fly — close enough), and other cultural figures. |
Taxonomic databases |
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Records verified against published scientific literature, government databases, and beekeeping organizations where possible. Some figures represent best available estimates. If you have a correction or addition, we are very interested. Bees Are Good takes records seriously.