100 Notable alumni of University of Warsaw

Jakub Berman was a Polish communist politician. An activist during the Second Polish Republic, in post-war communist Poland he was a member of the Politburo of the Polish Workers' Party (PPR) and then of the Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR). From 1948, he was considered the second most powerful politician in Poland after President Bolesław Bierut, until he was removed...

Małgorzata Magda Umer-Przeradzka was a Polish singer, performer of sung poetry, journalist, author, film director, screenwriter, and actress. Umer released five studio albums and won various competitions throughout her career.

Luna Wielgomas, known professionally as Luna (stylised in all caps), is a Polish singer and songwriter. She represented Poland in the Eurovision Song Contest 2024 with the song "The Tower".

Ludwik Stanisław Dorn was a Polish conservative politician, who served as Deputy Prime Minister and member of Sejm elected on 5 November 2007.

Agnieszka Wagner is a Polish actress. She has appeared in more than fifty films since 1989.

Mariusz Adam Szczygieł is a Polish journalist and writer. He is the winner of the 2009 European Book Prize for Gottland and the 2019 Nike Award, the most important prize in Polish literature.

Andrzej Rzepliński is a Polish lawyer, Professor of Jurisprudence, human right expert, member of International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights, a judge of the Polish Constitutional Tribunal from 2007 and its president from 2010 to 2016.

Zygmunt Marek "Muniek" Staszczyk is a Polish vocalist, founder, bandleader, and initially also bassist of T.Love. He was also one of two producers of I Hate Rock'n'Roll, the 2006 T.Love album. He cooperated with many Polish artists and bands such as Maanam, Kasia Nosowska, Krzysztof Krawczyk, Pidzama Porno, and Habakuk.

Aleksander Kamiński, assumed name: Aleksander Kędzierski. Also known under aliases such as Dąbrowski, J. Dąbrowski, Fabrykant, Faktor, Juliusz Górecki, Hubert, Kamyk, Kaźmierczak, Bambaju (28 January 1903 - 15 March 1978) was a Polish educator, co-founder of Cub Scouts methodology, and soldier of the Home Army. He was one of the ideological leaders of the Grey Ranks and chairman of the...

Katarzyna Pełczyńska-Nałęcz is a Polish sociologist and the current Minister of Development Funds and Regional Policy since 2023. She was formerly the Ambassador of Poland to Russia from 2014 to 2016. She became the first woman ambassador of Poland in Moscow since the establishment of Polish–Russian relations, between the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Moscow in the...

Artur Józef Andrus is a Polish journalist, poet, singer-songwriter and cabaret artist. He is best known for his radio shows at Polskie Radio Program III, and as a master of ceremonies during various TV shows.

Andrzej Pilipiuk, Polish humoristic science-fiction and fantasy author. He debuted in 1996 with short story "Hiena", which featured the first appearance of Jakub Wędrowycz, an alcoholic exorcist. Since that time, Pilipiuk has written over a hundred of other short stories about that character.

Krzysztof Jan Śmiszek is a Polish lawyer, politician, human rights and minority rights activist, and Doctor of Legal Sciences. He is a co-founder and former chair of the Polish Society of Anti-Discrimination Law, a member of the Sejm 9th and 10th terms (2019–2024), vice-chair of the New Left, Deputy Minister of Justice from 2023 to 2024, and a Member of...

Jerzy Władysław Giedroyć was a Polish writer, lawyer, publicist and political activist. For many years, he worked as editor of the highly influential Paris-based periodical, Kultura.

Rafał Aleksander Ziemkiewicz is a Polish political and science fiction author and right-wing publicist. Winner of the Janusz A. Zajdel Award (1995, 1998 in novels category and 1996 for short stories). Recipient of the ESFS award for Best Author for 1997.

Dorota Wellman is a Polish journalist, television and radio personality and television producer. She graduated in Polish studies and Art history from University of Warsaw. Wellman debuted in 1980s in Solidarity Radio and later in Radio Eska. Since 2006 she is known for presenting TV programme Dzień Dobry TVN.

Anna Danuta Wendzikowska is a Polish actress, journalist and television presenter. She was a correspondent of Dzień Dobry TVN from 2007–2022.

Maciej Roman Wąsik is a Polish politician who served as Secretary of State of the Ministry of Interior and Administration from 2019 to 2023, under Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki.

Bogusław Wołoszański is a Polish journalist, author, populariser of history, and politician. He is well known as the author of historical books and the originator and creator of the TVP1 television program "Sensations of the 20th Century." Wołoszański serves as MP for the 10th Sejm.

Gustaw Herling-Grudziński was a Polish writer, journalist, essayist, World War II underground fighter, and political dissident abroad during the period of Soviet and communist rule. He is best known for writing a personal account of life in the Soviet Gulag entitled A World Apart, first published in 1951 in London.

Robert Tomasz Mazurek is a Polish journalist, columnist and traveler.

Joanna Mucha is a Polish liberal politician, economist, member of the Polish Sejm, academic teacher, doctor of economics She served as Minister of Sport and Tourism from 2011 to 2013 in the Second Cabinet of Donald Tusk. She also served as Deputy Minister of National Education from 2023 to 2025. in the Third Cabinet of Donald Tusk. In 2001 she...

Małgorzata Maria Gersdorf is a Polish lawyer and judge who served as the First President of the Supreme Court of Poland. She was appointed in 2014 and her six-year term ended on 30 April 2020.

Stefan Michnik was a military judge of the Soviet-dominated regime in post-World War II Poland, and a captain in the communist Polish People's Army. He was involved in the politically-motivated arrest, trial, imprisonment and/or execution of a number of Polish anti-communist fighters and activists. Many of those persecuted by Michnik also fought against Nazi Germany during World War II, as...

Michał Tomasz Kamiński is a Polish politician and a member of the Senate with the Union of European Democrats. He was chairman of the European Conservatives and Reformists in the European Parliament from July 2009 until March 2011.

Edward Stachura [ˈɛdvard sta'xura] was a Polish poet, writer and translator. He rose to prominence in the 1960s, receiving prizes for both poetry and prose. His literary output includes four volumes of poetry, three collections of short stories, two novels, a book of essays, and the final work, Fabula rasa, which is difficult to classify. In addition to writing, Stachura...

Max Kolonko is a conservative Polish-American journalist, political scientist, author, former White House correspondent and political commentator. He won the Kisiel Prize for journalism in 2015.

Grzegorz Miecugow was a Polish media personality of Armenian-Georgian descent. He had an extensive career as a journalist, newscaster, editor, and columnist.

Piotr Tadeusz Gliński is a Polish sociologist, professor, university lecturer and politician. He served as president of the Polish Sociological Association from 2005 to 2011. He was the nominee of Law and Justice for Prime Minister of Poland in 2012 and again in 2014. In the cabinet of Beata Szydło, he served as the First Deputy Prime Minister and the...

Agata Maria Passent is a Polish journalist and writer.

Daniel Passent was a Polish journalist and writer. He was the author of the En passant blog, which was appearing as a column in a Polish weekly Polityka.

Sir Joseph Rotblat KCMG CBE FRS was a Polish and British physicist. During World War II he worked on Tube Alloys and the Manhattan Project, but left the Los Alamos Laboratory on grounds of conscience after it became clear to him in 1944 that Germany had ceased development of an atomic bomb.

Alfred Tarski was a Polish-American logician and mathematician. A prolific author best known for his work on model theory, metamathematics, and algebraic logic, he also contributed to abstract algebra, topology, geometry, measure theory, mathematical logic, set theory, type theory, and analytic philosophy.

Hanna Lis, née Kedaj is a Polish TV journalist.

Katarzyna Pakosińska is a Polish actress, comedian and former member of Polish cabaret group Kabaret Moralnego Niepokoju.

Stanisław Wojciechowski was a Polish politician and scholar who served as President of Poland between 1922 and 1926, during the Second Polish Republic.

Bronisław Geremek was a Polish social historian and politician. He was an opposition activist in the Polish People's Republic and participated in the Polish Round Table Agreement.

Hubert Kirił Urbański is a Polish actor, journalist and presenter of Warner Bros. Discovery's TVN of Bulgarian origin.

Piotr Igor Ikonowicz is a Polish politician.

Brigadier General Sławomir Petelicki was the first commander of the Polish special forces unit GROM from July 13, 1990, until December 19, 1995. Later, he was the head of the Foundation of Former GROM Soldiers.

Count Napoleon Stanisław Adam Feliks Zygmunt Krasiński was a Polish poet traditionally ranked after Adam Mickiewicz and Juliusz Słowacki as one of Poland's Three Bards – the Romantic poets who influenced national consciousness in the period of Partitions of Poland.

Halina Maria Frąckowiak is a Polish pop and rock singer, composer and author. She rose to fame during Poland's 1970s funk scene. In 1974 she released her first album "Idę" on Warner Music / WMI. After wards she released albums such as "Geira" in 1977 which reflected the atmosphere and style of Poland.

Jan Wiktor Brzechwa was a Polish poet, author and lawyer, known mostly for his contribution to children's literature.

Alicja Majewska is a Polish singer. From 1971 to 1974, she was a member of the band Partita as a vocalist. In 1975, she received the main award at the National Festival of Polish Song in Opole. She was also awarded a Grand Prix at the 1980 festival in Rostock, and was honored in Havana (1985). She received the "Gloria...

Tomasz Rafał Lis [ˈtɔmaʂ ˈlis] is a Polish journalist and former TV anchor of “TVN Fakty” ("TVN Facts") and “Wydarzenia” ("Events").

Wojciech Młynarski was a Polish poet, singer, songwriter, translator and director. A well-known figure on the Polish musical scene, he was most famous for his ballads and what is known as sung poetry, as well as for his collaboration with numerous vocalists and cabarets. He wrote lyrics to more than 2,000 songs, a small fraction of which he sang himself....

Kaja Godek is a Polish ultra-conservative activist and leader of the foundation Życie i Rodzina ("life and family"). She proposed a law to ban the abortion of fetuses with birth defects or high probability thereof (Stop aborcji) in 2013 and a law to ban LGBT marches (Stop LGBT) in 2021.

Jacek Jan Kuroń was a Polish social activist, politician, and one of the most prominent democratic leaders of the opposition in the People's Republic of Poland (PRL). Kuroń played a pivotal role in challenging Communist rule and advocating for democratic reforms during the latter half of the 20th century. After the PRL fell in 1989, Kuroń served as Minister of...

Kamila Skolimowska was a Polish hammer thrower. She is best known for her gold medal in the Sydney 2000 Summer Olympics, which made her the youngest Olympic hammer champion, as well as for her two medals from the European Championships. Her personal best throw, and former Polish record, was 76.83 metres, achieved in May 2007 in Doha. She died on...

Hanna Beata Gronkiewicz-Waltz is a Polish politician and lawyer, Professor of Jurisprudence and politician who served as the city mayor of Warsaw between 2006 and 2018. She is the first and so far only woman to have held this position.

Anna Grodzka is a Polish politician. A trans woman, she was elected to the Sejm in the 2011 Polish parliamentary elections as a candidate for the left-liberal Palikot's Movement, and was the first openly transgender Member of Parliament in Poland, and the third openly transgender member of a national parliament worldwide, after Georgina Beyer (in office 1999–2005) in New Zealand...

Jan Karski was a Polish soldier, resistance-fighter, and diplomat during World War II. He is known for having acted as a courier in 1940–1943 to the Polish government-in-exile and to Poland's Western Allies about the situation in German-occupied Poland. He reported about the state of Poland, its many competing resistance factions, and also about Germany's destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto...

Tadeusz Mazowiecki was a Polish author, journalist, philanthropist and politician, formerly one of the leaders of the Solidarity movement, and the first non-communist Polish prime minister since 1946, having held the post from 1989 to 1991.

Jan Ferdynand Olszewski was a Polish conservative lawyer and politician who served as the Prime Minister of Poland for five months between December 1991 and early June 1992 and later became a leading figure of the conservative Movement for the Reconstruction of Poland.

Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński, was a Polish poet and Home Army soldier, one of the most well known of the Generation of Columbuses, the young generation of Polish poets, of whom several perished in the Warsaw Uprising and during the German occupation of Poland.

Władysław Bartoszewski was a Polish professor of History, politician, social activist, journalist, writer, historian and insurgent. A former Auschwitz concentration camp prisoner, he was a World War II resistance fighter as part of the Polish underground and participated in the Warsaw Uprising. After the war he was persecuted and imprisoned by the ruling Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR) of the...

Włodzimierz Czarzasty is a Polish politician who serves as the chairperson of the New Left party (Nowa Lewica). He has been serving as Marshal of the Sejm since 18 November 2025. He has also served as a Deputy Marshal of the Sejm from 2019 to 2025.

Jacek Marcin Kaczmarski ['jat͡sɛk kat͡ʂˈmarskʲi] was a Polish singer, songwriter, poet and author.

Irena Szewińska was a Polish sprinter who was one of the world's foremost track athletes for nearly two decades, in multiple events. She won a total of seven Olympic medals including three golds. She is the only athlete in history, male or female, to have held the world record in the 100 m, the 200 m and the 400 m...

Krystyna Pawłowicz is a Polish jurist and political figure. In the years 2007–2011, Pawłowicz was a Justice of the State Tribunal. She was a member of the Sejm (7th and 8th term) and was part of the National Council of the Judiciary. Pawłowicz was a judge of the Constitutional Tribunal from 5 December 2019 to 5 December 2025. She has...

Bronisław Maria Komorowski is a Polish politician and historian who served as the 5th president of Poland from 2010 to 2015. Komorowski previously served as Marshal of the Sejm from 2007 to 2010 and in this position Komorowski exercised the powers and duties of acting president following the death of President Lech Kaczyński in a plane crash on 10 April...

Kuba Grabowski, better known by his stage names Quebonafide and Jakub Grabowski, is a Polish rapper, singer and songwriter. He is a member of the duos Yochimu and Taconafide, and the founder of the record label QueQuality.

Roman Stanisław Dmowski was a Polish politician, statesman, and co-founder and chief ideologue of the National Democracy (abbreviated "ND": in Polish, "Endecja") political movement active during the interwar period.

Anna Maria Mucha is a Polish actress. She is best known to Western audiences as Danka Dresner in Steven Spielberg's 1993 film Schindler's List. In Poland, she is known for her regular role in the soap opera L for Love (2003–present).

Ryszard Kapuściński was a Polish journalist, photographer, poet and author. He received many prestigious awards and was considered a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature. Kapuściński's personal journals in book form attracted both controversy and admiration for blurring the conventions of reportage with the allegory and magical realism of literature. He was the Communist-era Polish Press Agency's only correspondent...

Adrian Tadeusz Zandberg is a Polish left-wing politician, computer programmer, and doctor of history, who has served as member of the Sejm since 2019. He is a founding member and co-leader of Partia Razem. He was the party's candidate in the 2025 Polish presidential election.

Julian Tuwim, known also under the pseudonym Oldlen as a lyricist, was a Jewish-Polish poet, born in Łódź, then part of the Russian Partition. He was educated in Łódź and in Warsaw where he studied law and philosophy at Warsaw University. After Poland's return to independence in 1918, Tuwim co-founded the Skamander group of experimental poets with Antoni Słonimski and...

Aleksander Głowacki, better known by his pen name Bolesław Prus ( Polish: [bɔˈlεswaf ˈprus] ), was a Polish journalist, novelist, a leading figure in the history of Polish literature and philosophy, and a distinctive voice in world literature.

Kornel Andrzej Morawiecki was a Polish politician, the founder and leader of Fighting Solidarity (Polish: Solidarność Walcząca), one of the splinters of the Solidarity movement in Poland during the 1980s. His academic background was that of a theoretical physicist. He was also a member of the 8th legislature of the Sejm, of which was also the Senior Marshal on 12...

Małgorzata Maria Kidawa-Błońska is a Polish politician, film producer, and sociologist currently serving as Marshal of the Senate. She was Marshal of the Sejm from 25 June 2015 to 11 November 2015 at the end of the Seventh term's composition of the lower house, after which being voted a Deputy Marshal of the Eighth and Ninth term, each time nominated...

Zygmunt Bauman was a Polish–British sociologist and philosopher. He was driven out of the Polish People's Republic during the 1968 Polish political crisis and forced to give up his Polish citizenship. He emigrated to Israel; three years later, he moved to the United Kingdom. He resided in England from 1971, where he studied at the London School of Economics and...

Rafał Kazimierz Trzaskowski is a Polish politician and political scientist specializing in European studies who has served as Mayor of Warsaw since 22 November 2018.

Janusz Ryszard Korwin-Mikke, also known by his initials JKM or simply as Korwin, is a Polish far-right politician, paleolibertarian and author. He was a member of the European Parliament from 2014 until 2018. He was the leader of the Congress of the New Right (KNP), which was formed in 2011 from Liberty and Lawfulness, which he led from its formation...

Filip Tadeusz Szcześniak, better known by the stage name Taco Hemingway (earlier FV), is a Polish rapper. He began recording in 2011, at which time he released - under the pseudonym Foodvillain - an English-language mixtape entitled Who Killed JFK. A year later, he adopted the pseudonym Taco Hemingway, under which he released the English-language EP Young Hems. In 2014,...

David Ben-Gurion was the primary national founder and first prime minister of the State of Israel. As head of the Jewish Agency from 1935, and later president of the Jewish Agency Executive, he was the de facto leader of the Jewish community in Palestine, and largely led the movement for an independent Jewish state in Mandatory Palestine.

Menachem Begin was an Israeli politician who founded Herut and Likud and served as prime minister of Israel from 1977 to 1983.

Irena Stanisława Sendler, operating under the nom de guerre Jolanta, was a Polish humanitarian, social worker, and nurse who served in the Polish Underground Resistance during World War II in German-occupied Warsaw. From October 1943 she was head of the children's section of Żegota, the Polish Council to Aid Jews (Polish: Rada Pomocy Żydom).

Lech Aleksander Kaczyński was a Polish politician who served as the 4th president of Poland from 2005 to 2010, when he died in the Smolensk air disaster. Earlier he served as the city mayor of Warsaw from 2002 to 2005. Prior to these tenures, Kaczyński served as President of the Supreme Audit Office from 1992 to 1995 and later Minister...

Henryk Adam Aleksander Pius Sienkiewicz, also known by the pseudonym Litwos ( Polish pronunciation: [ˈlitfɔs]), was a Polish epic writer. He is remembered for his historical novels, such as the Trilogy series and especially for his internationally known best-seller Quo Vadis (1895–1896).

Olga Nawoja Tokarczuk is a Polish writer, activist, and public intellectual. She is one of the most critically acclaimed and successful Polish authors of her generation. In 2019, she was awarded the 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature for "a narrative imagination that with encyclopedic passion represents the crossing of boundaries as a form of life". For her novel Flights, Tokarczuk...

Jeremi Przybora was a Polish poet, writer, actor and singer. He created the TV-series "Kabaret Starszych Panów" (Elderly Gentlemen's Cabaret) with Jerzy Wasowski and performed ballads and sung poetry, a popular music genre in Poland.

Dariusz Kajetan Rosati ['darjuʂ rɔsati] is a Polish professor of economics and a politician who served as a member of the European Parliament from 2004–2009 and 2014-2019, and a deputy of the Sejm from 2011-2014 and 2019-2023.

Joanna Natalia Jabłczyńska is a Polish actress and singer. Joanna is singer, lawyer, legal advisor, ambassador of many charity actions (especially for children), initially a presenter of youth programs.

Jacek Robert Sasin is a Polish politician and former local government official.

Barbara Anna Nowacka is a Polish politician who has served as Minister of National Education since December 2023. In October 2015 she became leader of the United Left coalition for the 2015 Polish parliamentary election, bringing together Labour Union, Your Movement, the Democratic Left Alliance, the Greens, and the Polish Socialist Party. Nowacka is the daughter of the late Deputy...

Hilary Koprowski was a Polish virologist and immunologist active in the United States who demonstrated the world's first effective live polio vaccine. He authored or co-authored over 875 scientific papers and co-edited several scientific journals.

Frédéric François Chopin was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic period who wrote primarily for solo piano. He has maintained worldwide renown as a leading composer of his era whose "poetic genius was based on a professional technique that was without equal in his generation".

Magdalena Agnieszka Ogórek is a Polish TV presenter and politician. In 2015 she was a presidential candidate of Democratic Left Alliance.

Leszek Kołakowski was a Polish philosopher and historian of ideas. He is best known for his critical analysis of Marxist thought, as in his three-volume history of Marxist philosophy Main Currents of Marxism (1976). In his later work, Kołakowski increasingly focused on religious questions. In his 1986 Jefferson Lecture, he asserted that "we learn history not in order to know...

Juliusz Machulski is a Polish film director, screenwriter, producer and actor. Son of noted actor Jan Machulski, he became notable for his comedies ridiculing the life in communist-ruled Poland of the 1970s and 1980s. He is a member of the European Film Academy and the founder of the Zebra Film Studio. In 2014, he was awarded the Officer's Cross of...

Agnieszka Osiecka was a Polish poet, writer, author of theatre and television screenplays, film director and journalist. She was a prominent Polish songwriter, having authored the lyrics to more than 2000 songs, and is considered an icon of Polish culture.

Krzysztof Ibisz is a Polish game show host and television personality. He was a member of Polish Beer-Lovers' Party and a Deputy in the Polish Sejm from 1991–93.

Adam Michnik is a Polish historian, essayist, former dissident, public intellectual, as well as co-founder and editor-in-chief of the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza.

Wanda Wasilewska, also known by her Russian name Vanda Lvovna Vasilevskaya (Russian: Ва́нда Льво́вна Василе́вская) (21 January 1905 – 29 July 1964), was a Polish and Soviet novelist and journalist and a left-wing political activist.

Małgosia Bela is a Polish fashion model and actress. She made her debut as a runway model for Comme des Garçons, Givenchy, and Balenciaga in 1998, and appeared in various photoshoots for Vogue. In 2004, she made her film debut in the Polish film Ono, and in 2018 appeared in Luca Guadagnino's remake of Suspiria.

Krzysztof Pius Zanussi is a Polish film and theatre director, producer and screenwriter. He is a professor of European film at the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland where he conducts a summer workshop. He is also a professor at the Krzysztof Kieślowski Film School of the University of Silesia in Katowice.

Zbigniew Herbert was a Polish poet, essayist, drama writer and moralist. He is one of the best known and the most translated post-war Polish writers. While he was first published in the 1950s (a volume titled Chord of Light was issued in 1956), soon after he voluntarily ceased submitting most of his works to official Polish government publications. He resumed...

Jan Żabiński and his wife Antonina Żabińska (née Erdman) (1908–1971) were a Polish couple from Warsaw, recognized by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations for their heroic rescue of Jews during the Holocaust in Poland. Jan Żabiński was a zoologist and zootechnician by profession, a scientist, and organizer and director of the renowned Warsaw Zoo before and during World...

Wojciech Daniel Cejrowski is a Polish radio journalist, satirist, photographer, travel writer, artistic director of the Discover World library, and a member of The Explorers Club.