The commonly taught answer is that the practical incandescent light bulb was invented in Menlo Park, New Jersey, USA , where Thomas Edison’s research laboratory was located and where he developed his commercially viable lamp in 1879.

However, the story is more complex: earlier experimental electric lamps were developed in Britain (Humphry Davy in London, Warren de la Rue), Belgium (Marcellin Jobard), Russia (Alexander Lodygin), and Canada (Henry Woodward and Mathew Evans), so the “invention of the light bulb” was actually a multinational, decades‑long process rather than a single moment in one place.