Merge Sort

John von Neumann, 1945

Invented by John von Neumann in 1945, merge sort was one of the first algorithms designed for electronic computers. It divides the input into two halves, recursively sorts them, then merges the two sorted halves in linear time. With a guaranteed O(n log n) time complexity, it remains a foundational comparison-based sorting algorithm. The visualization shows bars being split and merged, with gold highlighting active comparisons and teal marking settled elements.