Top 40 Engineering Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “I don’t spend my time pontificating about high-concept things; I spend my time solving engineering and manufacturing problems.”

— Elon Musk

2. “Engineering is the closest thing to magic that exists in the world.”

— Elon Musk

Also featured in: Science Quotes, Technology Quotes, Innovation Quotes

3. “Scientists study the world as it is, engineers create the world that never has been.”

— Theodore von Karman

Also featured in: Study Quotes

4. “I didn’t fail 1000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1000 steps.”

— Thomas A. Edison

Also featured in: Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes, Persistence Quotes, Learning Quotes, Challenges Quotes

5. “The desire that guides me in all I do is the desire to harness the forces of nature to the service of mankind.”

— Nikola Tesla

Also featured in: Changing the World Quotes, Science Quotes, Desire Quotes, Technology Quotes

6. “Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world.”

— Isaac Asimov

7. “Strive for perfection in everything. Take the best that exists and make it better. If it doesn’t exist, create it. Accept nothing nearly right or good enough.”

— Henry Royce

Also featured in: Excellence Quotes

8. “Talk is cheap. Show me the code.”

— Linus Torvalds

Also featured in: Action Quotes, Programming Quotes, Productivity Quotes, Teamwork Quotes

9. “Genius is 1% inspiration, and 99% perspiration.”

— Thomas A. Edison

Also featured in: Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes, Startup Quotes, Perseverance Quotes, Hard Work Quotes

10. “There is no substitute for hard work.”

— Thomas A. Edison

Also featured in: Motivational Quotes, Startup Quotes, Hard Work Quotes, Life Philosophy Quotes

11. “Code never lies, comments sometimes do.”

— Ron Jeffries

Also featured in: Programming Quotes, Technology Quotes

12. “There's a way to do it better - find it.”

— Thomas A. Edison

Also featured in: Change Quotes, Science Quotes, Achievement Quotes, Innovation Quotes

13. “I do not think there is any thrill that can go through the human heart like that felt by the inventor as he sees some creation of the brain unfolding to success. Such emotions make a man forget food, sleep, friends, love, everything.”

— Nikola Tesla

Also featured in: Success Quotes, Creativity Quotes, Technology Quotes, Innovation Quotes

14. “Software is eating the world.”

— Marc Andreessen

Also featured in: Programming Quotes, Innovation Quotes, Quotes About the World

15. “We’re changing the world with technology.”

— Bill Gates

Also featured in: Business Quotes, Change Quotes, Optimistic Quotes, Technology Quotes

16. “Avoiding complexity reduces bugs.”

— Linus Torvalds

Also featured in: Programming Quotes, Simplicity Quotes

17. “Negative results are just what I want. They’re just as valuable to me as positive results. I can never find the thing that does the job best until I find the ones that don’t.”

— Thomas A. Edison

Also featured in: Failure Quotes, Effort Quotes, Science Quotes, Quotes About Trying

18. “Make it work, make it right, make it fast.”

— Kent Beck

Also featured in: Programming Quotes, Quotes About Work, Technology Quotes

19. “Premature optimization is the root of all evil.”

— Donald Knuth

Also featured in: Programming Quotes, Evil Quotes

20. “Theory and practice sometimes clash. And when that happens, theory loses. Every single time.”

— Linus Torvalds

Also featured in: Practice Quotes

21. “If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it.”

— Lord Kelvin

Also featured in: Progress Quotes

22. “Simplicity is prerequisite for reliability.”

— Edsger W. Dijkstra

Also featured in: Programming Quotes, Simplicity Quotes

23. “Think twice, code once.”

— Waseem Latif

24. “I want to make rockets 100 times, if not 1,000 times better. The ultimate objective is to make humanity a multiplanet species. Thirty years from now, there’ll be a base on the moon and on Mars, and people will be going back and forth on SpaceX rockets.”

— Elon Musk

Also featured in: Future Quotes, Vision Quotes, Space Quotes, Technology Quotes

25. “Quality is pride of workmanship.”

— W. Edwards Deming

Also featured in: Excellence Quotes, Quality Quotes

26. “If anything can go wrong it will.”

— Edward A. Murphy, Jr.

Also featured in: Failure Quotes, Silly Quotes, Crazy Quotes, Principles And Laws

27. “Go for civil engineering, because civil engineering is the branch of engineering which teaches you the most about managing people. Managing people is a skill which is very, very useful and applies almost regardless of what you do.”

— John Harvey-Jones

Also featured in: Career Development Quotes, Quotes About Skills

28. “A fool with a tool is still a fool.”

— Grady Booch

29. “Invention is the most important product of man’s creative brain. The ultimate purpose is the complete mastery of mind over the material world, the harnessing of human nature to human needs.”

— Nikola Tesla

Also featured in: Creative Quotes

30. “I think, fundamentally, open source does tend to be more stable software. It’s the right way to do things.”

— Linus Torvalds

Also featured in: Programming Quotes, Technology Quotes

31. “Engineers like to solve problems. If there are no problems handily available, they will create their own problems.”

— Scott Adams

Also featured in: Anger Quotes

32. “To measure is to know.”

— Lord Kelvin

Also featured in: Statistics Quotes

33. “I think of myself as an engineer, not as a visionary or ‘big thinker.’ I don’t have any lofty goals.”

— Linus Torvalds

34. “It is a simple feat of scientific, electrical engineering – only expensive – oh blind, faint-hearted, doubting world.”

— Nikola Tesla

Also featured in: Science Quotes

35. “Engineering is a creative practice.”

— Cory Arcangel

36. “Strive for perfection in everything you do.”

— Henry Royce

37. “The progressive development of man is vitally dependent on invention.”

— Nikola Tesla

38. “Clean code always looks like it was written by someone who cares.”

— Robert C. Martin

Also featured in: Programming Quotes

39. “I have not failed 700 times. I have not failed once. I have succeeded in proving that those 700 ways will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.”

— Thomas A. Edison

Also featured in: Persistence Quotes, Obstacles Quotes, Genius Quotes

40. “Take the best that exists and make it better.”

— Henry Royce