The following is a timeline of gravitational physics and general relativity.

• 3rd century B.C. – Aristarchus of Samos proposes the heliocentric model.^[1]

• 1543 – Nicolaus Copernicus publishes On the Revolutions of Heavenly Spheres.^[1]
• 1583 – Galileo Galilei deduces the period relationship of a pendulum from observations (according to later biographer).
• 1586 – Simon Stevin demonstrates that two objects of different mass accelerate at the same rate when dropped.^[2]
• 1589 – Galileo Galilei describes a hydrostatic balance for measuring specific gravity.
• 1590 – Galileo Galilei formulates modified Aristotelean theory of motion (later retracted) based on density rather than weight of objects.

• 1602-1608 – Galileo Galilei experiments with pendulum motion and inclined planes; deduces his law of free fall; and discovers that projectiles travel along parabolic trajectories.^[3]
• 1609 – Johannes Kepler announces his first two laws of planetary motion.^[4]
• 1619 – Johannes Kepler unveils his third law of planetary motion.^[4]
• 1632 – Galileo Galilei publishes The Sidereal Messenger, detailing his astronomical discoveries made with a telescope.^[5]
• 1665-66 – Isaac Newton introduces an inverse-square law of universal gravitation uniting terrestrial and celestial theories of motion and uses it to predict the orbit of the Moon and the parabolic arc of projectiles (the latter using his generalization of the binomial theorem).^[6]
• 1684 – Isaac Newton proves that planets moving under an inverse-square force law will obey Kepler's laws in a letter to Edmond Halley.^[6]
• 1686 – Isaac Newton uses a fixed length pendulum with weights of varying composition to test the weak equivalence principle to 1 part in 1000.^[7][8]
• 1686 – Isaac Newton publishes his Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, where he develops his calculus, states his laws of motion and gravitation, proves the shell theorem, describes his rotating bucket thought experiment, explains the tides, and calculates the figure of the Earth.^[7]

• 1705 – Edmond Halley predicts the return of Halley's comet in 1758,^[9] the first use of Newton's laws by someone other than Newton himself.^[10]
• 1728 – Isaac Newton posthumously publishes his cannonball thought experiment.^[11][12]
• 1742 – Colin Maclaurin studies a self-gravitating uniform liquid drop at equilibrium, the Maclaurin spheroid.^[13][14]
• 1755 – Immanuel Kant advances Emanuel Swedenborg's nebular hypothesis on the origin of the Solar System.^[15]
• 1765 – Leonhard Euler discovers the first three Lagrange points.^[16][17]
• 1767 – Leonhard Euler solves Euler's restricted three-body problem.^[18]
• 1772 – Joseph-Louis Lagrange discovers the two remaining Lagrange points.^[19]
• 1796 – Pierre-Simon de Laplace independently introduces the nebular hypothesis.^[15]
• 1798 – Henry Cavendish tests Newton's law of universal gravitation using a torsion balance, leading to the first accurate value for the gravitational constant and the mean density of the Earth.^[20][21]

• 1846 – Urbain Le Verrier and John Couch Adams, studying Uranus' orbit, independently prove that another, farther planet must exist. Neptune was found at the predicted moment and position.
• 1855 – Le Verrier observes a 35 arcsecond per century excess precession of Mercury's orbit and attributes it to another planet, inside Mercury's orbit. The planet was never found. See Vulcan.
• 1876 – William Kingdon Clifford suggests that the motion of matter may be due to changes in the geometry of space^[22]
• 1882 – Simon Newcomb observes a 43 arcsecond per century excess precession of Mercury's orbit
• 1887 – Albert A. Michelson and Edward W. Morley in their famous experiment do not detect the ether drift.^[23][24]
• 1889 – Loránd Eötvös uses a torsion balance to test the weak equivalence principle to 1 part in one billion.^[25]
• 1893 – Ernst Mach states Mach's principle; first constructive attack on the idea of Newtonian absolute space
• 1898 – Henri Poincaré states that simultaneity is relative.
• 1899 – Hendrik Antoon Lorentz published the Lorentz transformations.

• 1902 – Paul Gerber explains the movement of the perihelion of Mercury using finite speed of gravity.^[26] His formula, at least approximately, matches the later model from Einstein's general relativity, but Gerber's theory was incorrect.
• 1902 – Henri Poincaré questions the concept of simultaneity.^[27]
• 1905 – Albert Einstein completes his special theory of relativity^[28] and discovers the equivalence of mass and energy,^[29] ${\displaystyle E=mc^{2}}$ in modern form.^[30][31][27]
• 1907 – Albert Einstein introduces the principle of equivalence of gravitational and inertial mass and uses it to predict gravitational lensing and gravitational redshift,^[32] historically known as the Einstein shift.^[33]
• 1907-9 – Hermann Minkowski introduces the Minkowski spacetime. His paper was published posthumously.^[34][35][36]
• 1909 – Max Born proposes his notion of rigidity.^[37][38]
• 1909 – Paul Ehrenfest states the Ehrenfest paradox.^[39][40]

• 2003 – Arvind Borde, Alan Guth, and Alexander Vilenkin prove the Borde–Guth–Vilenkin theorem.^[207][208]
• 2002 – First data collection of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO).
• 2002 – James Williams, Slava Turyshev, and Dale Boggs conduct stringent lunar test of violations of the principle of equivalence.^[209]
• 2005 – Daniel Holz and Scott Hughes coin the term "standard sirens".^[210]
• 2009 – Gravity Probe B experiment verifies the geodetic effect to 0.5%.^[211][212]

• Timeline of black hole physics
• Timeline of special relativity and the speed of light
• List of contributors to general relativity