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Exercise 326Number theory › PrimesL1Added 31 Oct 2026

There are infinitely many primes

#primes#proof by contradiction

Statement

Prove that there are infinitely many prime numbers.

Hint

Suppose there are finitely many, multiply them all and add 11.

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Solution

Suppose there are only finitely many primes p1,…,pkp_1,\dots,p_k. Let
N=p1p2⋯pk+1>1.N=p_1p_2\cdots p_k+1>1.

Then NN has a prime divisor pp. This prime must be one of the pip_i, by assumption. But pip_i divides p1⋯pkp_1\cdots p_k and divides NN, so it divides their difference N−p1⋯pk=1N-p_1\cdots p_k=1, which is impossible.

This contradiction shows that the list of primes cannot be finite.