This Raven is a Tic-Tac-Toe All-Star

You might have heard the term “bird brain” used to insult someone’s intelligence. However, for the raven, their “bird brain” is what makes them extremely smart. In fact, this Instagram video shows a raven winning a game of tic-tac-toe against a human, demonstrating the bird’s problem-solving abilities and intelligence levels. 

Why Are Ravens So Smart?

Ravens are thought to be smart for a variety of reasons. According to a 2023 study published in the Journal of Ornithology, ravens are social creatures that meet at foraging sites and develop foraging groups with different hierarchies and dominance rankings. Because they’re forced to remember different group members and their group dynamics, ravens have naturally developed conflict resolution and other socio-cognitive skills. For the raven, survival goes hand-in-hand with their social intelligence and communication skills. 

Specifically, ravens have to work in pairs to hunt their prey. One bird distracts the mother while the other goes in for the steal/kill. This type of collaboration requires complex communication and advanced cognitive abilities. In other words, ravens must rely on their instincts to survive.

A 2020 study published in the journal Nature also found that ravens have full-blown cognitive skills by four months old. Additionally, their physical and social cognitive performances were on par with those of adult apes.

Are Ravens Smarter Than All Other Birds?

Ravens are among the smartest species of birds. In fact, experts consider birds within the Corvid family (which includes ravens, crows, magpies, and jays) to be the most intelligent of all birds. 

According to Louis Lefebvre, a behaviorist at McGill University in Montreal, the American crow—a close relative of ravens—is the smartest bird of all. He based his findings on a test he developed that gauges bird IQ. Lefebvre previously noted in a 2002 McGill Reporter article that crows have the highest brain-to-body size ratios. This naturally contributes to their intelligence.

Many experts also credit the raven’s large brain size for their intelligence. Ravens are eerily similar to crows, and they both excel in problem-solving tasks, tool use, and social interactions. 

Are Ravens Trainable? 

Ravens are naturally incredibly smart, but they’re also quite trainable. A study in the journal Animal Behavior found that ravens can remember whether experimenters were fair to them. Not only that, but they showed they preferred working with fair experimenters in follow-up interactions. This proves their ability to form judgements and retain them in their memory for some time. 

The raven’s superior memory, in addition to its high intelligence, is likely why the bird is so easily trainable. In fact, the bird in this Instagram video was probably trained to play tic-tac-toe, eventually retaining enough information about the game to win against its human opponent.

However, while they do pick up on tricks quickly, ravens’ intelligence levels aren’t just a result of training. These birds are pretty much born smart.