100 Notable alumni of Charles University

Vladimír "Vlado" Clementis was a Slovak politician, lawyer, publicist, literary critic, author and a prominent member of the Czechoslovak Communist Party. Between 1948 and 1950, he served as Minister of Foreign Affairs of Czechoslovakia. In 1952, he was accused of "Titoism" and "national deviation" during the Slánský trial and executed.

Olga Richterová is a Czech linguist and politician. She was the vice-chairwoman of the Czech Pirate Party from January 2018 to January 2022 and is a member of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic since the 2017 parliamentary election. Richterová was re-elected in the October 2021 Czech parliamentary election on a joint list of the Pirates and Mayors...

Petr Pithart is a Czech politician, lawyer and political scientist who served as Prime Minister of the Czech Republic (then a federal region of Czechoslovakia) from 6 February 1990 to 2 July 1992. He was also the Senator for Chrudim from 1996 to 2012 and served as President of the Senate from 8 January 1996 to 16 December 1998 and...

Alice Masaryková or Alice Garrigue Masaryk was a Czech teacher, sociologist and politician. She is a prominent figure within the field of applied sociology and known to many as the daughter of Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk and the First Lady of Czechoslovakia.

Jan Janský was a Czech serologist, neurologist and psychiatrist. He is credited with the classification of blood into four types (I, II, III, IV).

Vladimír Špidla is a Czech politician who served as the prime minister of the Czech Republic from July 2002 to August 2004 and as European Commissioner for Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities from November 2004 to February 2010. He also served as chief adviser to Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka from 2014 to 2017.

František Hrubín was a Czech poet and writer.

David Navara is a Czech chess grandmaster. Awarded the title of Grandmaster by FIDE in 2002, he is a 13-time national champion (in 2004, 2005, 2010, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2020, 2022, 2023 and 2024).

Jaroslav Bašta was a Czech politician and diplomat. He was a signatory of Charter 77. Between 1998 and 2000 he served in the cabinet of Miloš Zeman as Minister without portfolio. Bašta became the Ambassador of the Czech Republic to Russia in September 2000. He served for five years in Russia, later becoming Ambassador of the Czech Republic to Ukraine,...

Eduard Hanslick was an Austrian music critic, aesthetician and historian. Among the leading critics of his time, he was the chief music critic of the Neue Freie Presse from 1864 until the end of his life. His best known work, the 1854 treatise Vom Musikalisch-Schönen (On the Musically Beautiful), was a landmark in the aesthetics of music and outlines much...

Pavel Kohout is a Czech and Austrian novelist, playwright, and poet. He was a member of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, a Prague Spring participant and dissident in the 1970s until he was not allowed to return from Austria. He was a founding member of the Charter 77 movement.

Michal Horáček is a Czech entrepreneur, lyricist, poet, writer, journalist and music producer. From 2007 until 2010, he was the chairman of the Czech Academy of Popular Music. He founded Czech betting company Fortuna. He stood to become Czech president in the 2018 presidential election, but came in 4th in the first round, failing to advance.

František Kriegel was a Czechoslovak politician, physician, and a member of the Communist Party reform wing of the Prague Spring (1968). He was the only one of the political leaders who, during the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia, declined to sign the Moscow Protocol.

Jiří Ovčáček is a Czech journalist and news columnist. He previously worked as the spokesman for Miloš Zeman during Zeman's presidency.

Andrija Mohorovičić was a Croatian geophysicist and academic. He is best known for the eponymous Mohorovičić discontinuity and is considered one of the founders of modern seismology. He is also considered among the greatest Croatian natural scientists.

Karel Janoušek, KCB was a senior Czechoslovak Air Force officer. He began his career as a soldier, serving in the Austrian Imperial-Royal Landwehr 1915–16, Czechoslovak Legion 1916–20 and Czechoslovak Army 1920–24.

Karl František Koecher is a Czechoslovak mole known to have penetrated the CIA during the Cold War.

Michal Šimečka is a Slovak politician, journalist, and researcher, who served as a Vice-President of the European Parliament between 2022 and 2023. He also became a Member of the European Parliament between 2019 and 2023. In 2020, Šimečka was elected vice-president of the European political group Renew Europe. He is a co-founder of the social-liberal Progressive Slovakia party, leading it...

Ivan Olbracht, born Kamil Zeman, was a Czech writer, journalist, censor and translator of German prose.

Jiří Šlitr was a Czech songwriter, pianist, singer, actor and painter. Together with Jiří Suchý he significantly influenced Czech pop music and theatre in the 1960s.

Jan Niecisław Ignacy Baudouin de Courtenay, also known as Ivan Alexandrovich Baudouin de Courtenay, was a Polish linguist and Slavist, best known for his theory of the phoneme and phonetic alternations.

Petr Kolář is a Czech politician and diplomat, who has served as the Czech ambassador to several countries, including Russia (2010–2012) and the United States (2005–2010).

Jan Ledecký, better known as Janek Ledecký, is a Czech singer, songwriter, guitarist, and composer born in Prague. After graduating from Karla Sladkovského high school, he attended the law faculty of Charles University in Prague, earning a degree in law. Since 1981, he has played in the multiple award-winning rock band Žentour as lead vocalist and guitarist. In 1992, he...

Matěj Stropnický is a Czech left-wing politician, journalist, actor and former leader of the Green party. His father is Martin Stropnický, actor and former Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Josef Jungmann was a Czech linguist and poet. He was a leading figure of the Czech National Revival and together with Josef Dobrovský, he is considered to be a creator of the modern Czech language. The Josef Jungmann Award for the best translation into Czech is named after him.

Jerome of Prague was a Czech scholastic philosopher and theologian. Jerome was one of the chief followers of Jan Hus and was burned for heresy at the Council of Constance.

Tomáš Halík is a Czech Catholic priest, philosopher, and theologian. He is a professor of sociology at the Charles University in Prague, pastor of the Academic Parish by St. Salvator Church in Prague, and president of the Czech Christian Academy.

Michael V. E. "Misha" Glenny is an English journalist and broadcaster, specialising in southeast Europe, global organised crime, and cybersecurity. He has been Rector of the Institute for Human Sciences (IWM, Institut für die Wissenschaften vom Menschen) in Vienna since 2022.

Jiří Macháček is a Czech actor and singer.

Karel Poláček was a Czechoslovak writer, humorist and journalist of Jewish descent.

Karel Kramář was a Czech politician. He was a representative of the major Czech political party, the Young Czechs, in the Austrian Imperial Council from 1891 to 1915 (where he was also known as Karl Kramarsch), becoming the party leader in 1897.

Jan Hamáček is a Czech politician who was leader of the Czech Social Democratic Party (ČSSD) from February 2018 until October 2021, and minister of the Interior from June 2018 to December 2021. He also served as the President of the Chamber of Deputies from 2013 to 2017, and was acting minister of Foreign Affairs from June to October 2018...

Jan Lipavský is a Czech politician and information technology manager, who served as Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic from December 2021 to December 2025, in the Cabinet of Petr Fiala. A former member of the Czech Pirate Party, he was a member of the Chamber of Deputies from October 2017 to October 2021.

Vilém Flusser was a Czech-born Brazilian philosopher, writer and journalist, best known for his contributions to media studies, communication theory, and the philosophy of language. He lived for a long period in São Paulo (where he became a Brazilian citizen) and later in France, and his works are written in many different languages.

Zuzana Navarová de Tejada was a Czech singer and songwriter. She began her career in the early 1980s as a member of Nerez, and gradually become one of the most significant personalities of the Czech folk and world music scene. Her style was partially inspired by Latin American music.

Roman Prymula is a Czech physician, professor of epidemiology, and a retired army colonel.

Marek Hilšer is a Czech politician and university lecturer who served as the senator for Prague 2 from 2018 to 2024. He also stood in the 2018 and 2023 Czech presidential elections.

Jan Kodeš is a Czech former professional tennis player. A three-time major singles champion, Kodeš was one of the premier players in the early 1970s.

Vladimír Franz, is a Czech composer, painter, university scholar and occasional journalist, poet and playwright. Since the mid-1980s, he has composed stage music for more than 150 theatre performances—for many of which he was awarded national-level prizes. He has also composed a symphony, several operas, oratorios, a musical, a ballet, film music, and music for documentaries and radio plays. His...

Johann Wenzel Anton Stamitz was a Czech composer and violinist. Johann is considered the founding father of the Mannheim school, a composition style that his two surviving sons, Carl and Anton Stamitz, continued. His music is stylistically transitional between the Baroque and Classical periods and he is recognized for many innovations.

Pál Maléter was the military leader of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution who served as minister of defence in the third government of Imre Nagy.

Zdeněk Hřib is a Czech healthcare manager and politician, who has served as chair of the Czech Pirate Party since November 2024, and served as the Mayor of Prague from November 2018 to February 2023.

Oleh Oleksandrovych Kandyba, better known his pen name of Oleh Olzhych (Ukrainian: Олег Ольжич), was a Ukrainian poet and political activist. He was forced to emigrate from Ukraine in 1923 due to occupation by the Soviet Union and lived in Prague, Czechoslovakia. He graduated in 1929 from Charles University with a degree in archaeology. In 1929 he joined the Organization...

John Nepomucene Neumann CSsR was a Bohemian-born American prelate of the Catholic Church.

Karel Janeček is a Czech mathematician, entrepreneur, anti-corruption campaigner, creator of the D21 – Janeček method voting system and the online game Prezident 21.

Josef Škvorecký CM was a Czech-Canadian writer and publisher. He spent half of his life in Canada, publishing and supporting banned Czech literature during the communist era. Škvorecký was awarded the Neustadt International Prize for Literature in 1980. He and his wife were long-time supporters of Czech dissident writers before the fall of communism in that country. Škvorecký's fiction deals...

Pavel Fischer is a Czech politician and diplomat who has been Senator from Prague 12 since 2018. Fischer previously served as Czech Ambassador to France from 2003 to 2010. He was a presidential candidate in 2018, when he finished third with 10.23% of the vote, and in 2023, when he finished fourth with 6.75% of the vote. He was elected...

Jaroslav Heyrovský was a Czech chemist and inventor who received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1959 for his invention of polarography.

Josef Kajetán Tyl was a Czech dramatist, writer and actor. He was a notable figure in the Czech National Revival movement and is best known as the author of the current national anthem of the Czech Republic titled Kde domov můj?.

Viktor Dyk was a nationalist Czech poet, prose writer, playwright, politician and political writer. He was sent to jail during the First World War for opposing the Austro-Hungarian empire. He was one of the signatories of the Manifesto of Czech writers. Dyk co-founded a political party and entered politics. He died at age 53, leaving his many poems, plays and...

Alois Rašín was a Czech and Czechoslovak politician, economist, one of the founders of Czechoslovakia and first Ministry for Finance. He was the author of the first law of Czechoslovakia and creator of the country's currency, the Czechoslovak koruna. Rašín was a representative of conservative liberalism and was mortally wounded in assassination for being viewed as a head of the...

Jan Patočka was a Czech philosopher. Having studied in Prague, Paris, Berlin, and Freiburg, he was one of the last pupils of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. In Freiburg he also developed a lifelong philosophical friendship with Husserl's assistant Eugen Fink. Patočka worked in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic for almost his entire career, but never joined the Communist Party and...

Josef Dobrovský was a Czech philologist and historian. He was one of the most important figures of the Czech National Revival along with Josef Jungmann.

Jaroslav Vrchlický was a Czech lyrical poet. He was nominated for the Nobel prize in literature eight times.

Lubomír Štrougal was a Czech politician who was the prime minister of Czechoslovakia from 1970 to 1988.

Jiří Wolker was a Czech poet. He was also marginally journalist and playwright. Although he lived a short life, he became one of the most important Czech poets.

Adam Vojtěch is a Czech politician and lawyer serving as Minister of Health since 15 December 2025, in the third cabinet of Andrej Babiš. He served as Minister of Health from 13 December 2017 to 21 September 2020, in both the first and second cabinets of Prime Minister Andrej Babiš, and then for a second time from May until December...

Vaclav Smil is a Czech-Canadian scientist and policy analyst. He is Distinguished Professor Emeritus in the Faculty of Environment at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. His interdisciplinary research interests encompass energy, environmental, food, population, economic, historical and public policy studies. He has also applied these approaches to energy, food and environmental affairs of China.

Karel Jaromír Erben was a Czech folklorist. He is best known for his collection Kytice, which contains poems based on traditional and folkloric themes. He also wrote Písně národní v Čechách ("Folk Songs of Bohemia") which contains 500 songs and Prostonárodní české písně a říkadla ("Czech Folk Songs and Nursery Rhymes"), a five-part book that brings together most of Czech...

Věra Jourová is a Czech politician and lawyer who served as Vice-President of the European Commission for Values and Transparency from 2019 to 2024, and as the European Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality from 2014 to 2019. She served as a Member of the Chamber of Deputies between 2013 and 2014 and as the Czech Minister for Regional...

Max Wertheimer was a psychologist who was one of the three founders of Gestalt psychology, along with Kurt Koffka and Wolfgang Köhler. He is known for his book Productive Thinking and for conceiving the phi phenomenon as part of his work in Gestalt psychology.

Lucie Vondráčková is a Czech actress and singer.

Jan Evangelista Purkyně was a Czech anatomist and physiologist. In 1839, he coined the term "protoplasma" for the fluid substance of a cell. He was one of the best known scientists of his time. Such was his fame that when people from outside Europe wrote letters to him, all that they needed to put as the address was "Purkyně, Europe".

Ivan Bartoš is a Czech civil rights activist and politician for the Czech Pirate Party, who served as the Minister of Regional Development and Deputy Prime Minister for Digitalization in the Cabinet of Petr Fiala from December 2021 to September 2024. He has been a member of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic since October 2017, and was...

Bernard Bolzano was a Bohemian mathematician, logician, philosopher, theologian and Catholic priest of Italian extraction, also known for his liberal views.

Jiří Voskovec, known in the United States as George Voskovec, was a Czech-American actor. Throughout much of his career, he was associated with actor and playwright Jan Werich. In the U.S., he is known for his role as the polite Juror #11 in the 1957 film 12 Angry Men.

Alois Jirásek was a Czech writer, author of historical novels and plays. Jirásek was a high school history teacher in Litomyšl and later in Prague until his retirement in 1909. He wrote a series of historical novels imbued with faith in his nation and in progress toward freedom and justice. He was close to many important Czech personalities like Mikoláš...

Jan Werich was a Czech actor, playwright and writer.

Karel Havlíček Borovský was a Czech writer, poet, critic, politician, journalist, and publisher.

Zdeněk Svěrák is a Czech actor, humorist, playwright and screenwriter. He is one of the most well-known and popular Czech cultural personalities. Since 1968 he has appeared in 32 films.

János Hugo Bruno "Hans" Selye CC was a Hungarian-Canadian endocrinologist who conducted important scientific work on the hypothetical non-specific response of an organism to stressors. Although he did not recognize all of the many aspects of glucocorticoids, Selye was aware of their role in the stress response.

Karel Hynek Mácha was a Czech romantic poet. His poem Máj is among the most important poems in the history of Czech literature.

Stanislav Grof is a Czech-born American psychiatrist. Grof is one of the principal developers of transpersonal psychology and research into the use of non-ordinary states of consciousness for purposes of psychological healing, deep self-exploration, and obtaining growth and insights into the human psyche.

Milada Horáková was a Czech politician and a member of the underground resistance movement against Nazi Germany and then against the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. She was focused on preserving democratic institutions and women's rights.

Andreas Franz Scheuer is a German politician of the Christian Social Union (CSU) party. From 2018 to 2021, he was Federal Minister of Transport and Digital Infrastructure in the Cabinet Merkel IV. From 2013 to 2018, he was Secretary General of the CSU. From 2009 to 2013, he was Parliamentary Secretary of State in the former Federal Ministry for Transport,...

Bohumil Hrabal was a Czech writer, often named among the best Czech writers of the 20th century.

Milan Rastislav Štefánik was a Slovak politician, diplomat, aviator and astronomer. During World War I, he served at the same time as a general in the French Army and as Minister of War for Czechoslovakia. As one of the leading members of the Czechoslovak National Council (the resistance government), he contributed decisively to the cause of Czechoslovak sovereignty, since the...

Emil Dominik Josef Hácha was a Czech lawyer, serving as the president of Czechoslovakia from November 1938 to March 1939. In March 1939, after the breakup of Czechoslovakia, Hácha was the nominal president of the newly proclaimed German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia.

Michał Tomasz Wiśniowiecki, also known as Michał Korybut Wiśniowiecki (Lithuanian: Mykolas Kaributas Višnioveckis), and under a regal name Michael I (Polish: Michał I; Lithuanian: Mykolas I), was the ruler of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth as King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 29 September 1669 until his death in 1673.

Max Brod was an Israeli author, composer and journalist, born as a German-speaking Czech. He is notable for promoting the work of writer Franz Kafka and composer Leoš Janáček.

Franz Kafka was a German-language Jewish Czech writer and novelist born in Prague, in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Widely regarded as a major figure of 20th-century literature, his works fuse elements of realism and the fantastique, and typically feature isolated protagonists facing bizarre or surreal predicaments and incomprehensible socio-bureaucratic powers. The term Kafkaesque has entered the lexicon to describe situations like...

Charles I and IV was Emperor of Austria (as Charles I), King of Hungary (as Charles IV), and the ruler of the other states of the Habsburg monarchy from November 1916 until the monarchy was abolished in November 1918. He was the last of the monarchs belonging to the House of Habsburg-Lorraine to rule over Austria-Hungary. The son of Archduke...

Jan Hus, sometimes anglicized as John Goose or John Huss, and referred to in historical texts as Iohannes Hvs or Johannes Huss, was a Czech theologian and philosopher who became a Church reformer and the inspiration of Hussitism, a key predecessor to Protestantism, and a seminal figure in the Bohemian Reformation. Hus is considered to be the first Church reformer,...

Jan Palach was a Czech student of history and political economics at Charles University in Prague. His self-immolation in 1969 at the age of 20 was a political protest against the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 which brought an end to the Prague Spring.

Wenceslaus IV was King of Bohemia from 1378 until his death and King of Germany from 1376 until he was deposed in 1400. As he belonged to the House of Luxembourg, he was also Duke of Luxembourg from 1383 to 1388.

Edvard Beneš was a Czech politician and statesman who served as the president of Czechoslovakia from 1935 to 1938, and again from 1939 to 1948. During the first six years of his second stint, he led the Czechoslovak government-in-exile during World War II.

Christoph Willibald Gluck was a composer of Italian and French opera in the early classical period. Born in the Upper Palatinate and raised in Bohemia, both part of the Holy Roman Empire at the time, he gained prominence at the Habsburg court in Vienna. There he brought about the practical reform of opera's dramaturgical practices for which many intellectuals had...

John of Nepomuk was a saint of Bohemia. He was executed by King Wenceslaus IV of Bohemia for disobedience. John was thrown into the Vltava river.

Ivana Marie Trump was a Czech and American businesswoman, socialite, and model. She lived in Canada in the 1970s, before relocating to the United States and marrying Donald Trump in 1977. She held key managerial positions in the Trump Organization, as vice president of interior design, CEO and president of Trump's Castle casino resort, and manager of the Plaza Hotel.

Petr Fiala is a Czech politician and political scientist who served as the prime minister of the Czech Republic from 2021 to 2025 and leader of the Civic Democratic Party (ODS) from 2014 to 2026. He previously served as the Minister of Education, Youth and Sports from 2012 to 2013. Prior to entering politics, he was the rector of Masaryk...

Markéta Pekarová Adamová is a Czech politician who served as the President of the Chamber of Deputies from 2021 to 2025 and as leader of TOP 09 from 2019 to 2025. Pekarová Adamová was a member of the Chamber of Deputies from 2013 until 2025, when she decided not to seek re-election.

Stanislav Gross was a Czech lawyer and politician who served as the prime minister of the Czech Republic and leader of the Czech Social Democratic Party from 2004 until 2005 when he resigned as a result of his financial irregularities. He previously served as minister of the Interior in cabinets of Miloš Zeman and Vladimír Špidla from 2000 to 2004....

Marek Benda is a Czech politician and member of the Civic Democratic Party (ODS). He is currently the longest serving member of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic, having served from 1990 to 2002, and then again from 2004 until present. Since 2021 he has been the leader of the ODS group in the Chamber of Deputies.

Michal Viewegh is a Czech writer. He is the most published Czech author of all time, with over a million books sold. In 1993, he earned the prestigious Jiří Orten award for Czech writers 30 years old or younger.

Ivan Klíma was a Czech novelist and playwright. He received the Magnesia Litera award and the Franz Kafka Prize, among other honours.

David Švehlík is a Czech actor.

Milan Kundera was a Czech and French novelist. Kundera went into exile in France in 1975, acquiring citizenship in 1981. His Czechoslovak citizenship was revoked in 1979, but he was granted Czech citizenship in 2019.

Carl Menger von Wolfensgrün was an Austrian economist who contributed to the marginal theory of value. Menger is considered the founder of the Austrian school of economics.

Nikola Tesla was a Serbian-American engineer, futurist, and inventor. He is known for his contributions to the design of the modern alternating current (AC) electricity supply system.