The main treasure that Paul Erdős has left us is his collection of problems, most of which are still open today. These problems are seeds that Paul sowed and watered by giving numerous talks at meetings big and small, near and far. In the past, his problems have spawned many areas in graph theory and beyond (e.g., in number theory, probability, geometry, algorithms and complexity theory). Solutions or partial solutions to Erdős problems usually lead to further questions, often in new directions. These problems provide inspiration and serve as a common focus for all graph theorists. Through the problems, the legacy of Paul Erdős continues (particularly if solving one of these problems results in creating three new problems, for example.) There is a huge literature of almost 1500 papers written by Erdős and his (more than 460) collaborators. Paul wrote many problem papers, some of which appeared in various (really hard-to-find) proceedings. Here is an attempt to collect and organize these problems in the area of graph theory. The list here is by no means complete or exhaustive. Our goal is to state the problems, locate the sources, and provide the references related to these problems. We will include the earliest and latest known references without covering the entire history of the problems because of space limitations. (The most up-to-date list of Erdős’ papers can be found in [65]; an electronic file is maintained by Jerry Grossman at

Let G be a topological graph on n vertices in the plane, i.e., a graph drawn in the plane with its vertices represented as points and its edges represented as Jordan arcs connecting pairs of points. It is shown that if no two edges of any cycle of length 4 in G cross an odd number of times, then |E(G) | = O(n 8/5).

Abstract not found

AgraphH is called common if the sum of the number of copies of H in a graph G and the number in the complement of G is asymptotically minimized by taking G to be a random graph. Extending a conjecture of Erdős, Burr and Rosta conjectured that every graph is common. Thomason disproved both conjectures by showing that K4 is not common. It is now known that in fact the common graphs are very rare. Answering a question of Sidorenko and of Jagger, ˇSt’ovíček and Thomason from 1996 we show that the 5-wheel is common. This provides the first example of a common graph that is not three-colourable.