Matt Parker

Matthew Thomas Parker is an Australian recreational mathematician, author, comedian, YouTube personality, and science communicator based in the United Kingdom. His book Humble Pi was the first maths book in the UK to be a Sunday Times No. 1 bestseller. Parker was the Public Engagement in Mathematics Fellow at the Queen Mary University of London. Matt Parker was born in Perth, Australia, and grew up in the northern suburb of Duncraig. 

He began showing an interest in maths and science from a young age and, at one point, was part of his school's titration team. Parker went to the University of Western Australia and studied mechanical engineering before " realizing the genuine risk of being employable at the end of it." He switched to physics and later mathematics. His love of maths led him to want a job in the subject. While at university, Parker wrote comedy for Pelican, the students' magazine, and produced comedy sketches. Having become interested in comedy, he enrolled in a course for stand-up.

After college, Parker taught maths in Australia for a while before moving to London and continuing teaching. He supported education, working with universities and other organizations to arrange maths talks. He later went back to teaching before stopping after one year. He now helps students communicate mathematics to others, speaks at schools, does media work, and occasionally writes about maths. His goal is "to get more people more excited about maths."

Parker has appeared in numerous YouTube videos discussing various mathematics-related subjects. He has his own YouTube channel, "Stand-up Maths," with over one million subscribers. He also frequently appears as a guest on other popular media, such as Brady Haran's Numberphile and James May's Head Squeeze (now BritLab). In addition, Parker has made videos about unboxing calculators, including the Little Professor; he presents these videos as a member of a fictional "Calculator Appreciation Society." He also appeared in a Tom Scott YouTube video, where they gave tips for users of the London Underground.

In 2012, Parker and fellow comedian Timandra Harkness co-wrote a comedy show called Your Days are Numbered: The Maths of Death. They performed the show in Australia, at the Adelaide Fringe and Melbourne International Comedy Festival, on tour around England, and in Scotland, at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Parker has toured the UK solo as part of the comedy group Festival of the Spoken Nerd, along with Helen Arney and Steve Mould. His first solo tour, Matt Parker: Number Ninja, finished in July 2013, while his second solo tour, "Matt Parker: Now in 4D", started in late 2014.

He wrote Things to Make and Do in the Fourth Dimension. His second book, Humble Pi, was released in March 2019 and was a Sunday Times #1 bestseller. In 2014, Parker set up Think Maths, a team of experienced mathematics speakers who visit schools to run workshops and give talks for a wide range of ages and abilities to show students the wider world of maths beyond school while giving them a chance to develop mathematical thinking skills.

Parker is regularly on BBC Radio Four's Infinite Monkey Cage with Robin Ince and Brian Cox. He has also talked about maths-related topics on BBC News, Sky News, Channel 4, and CBBC, and occasionally writes for The Guardian. On TV, Parker regularly comments on Discovery's Outrageous Acts of Science. For the 2019 edition of the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures, televised on BBC Four, Parker assisted presenter Hannah Fry in several segments.