The English word reliability ('reliability') dates back to 1816 and is first attributed to the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge.[7] Before World War II, the term was mainly linked to repeatability; A test (in any type of science) was considered "reliable" if the same results were obtained repeatedly. In the 1920s, Dr. Walter A. Shewhart of Bell Labs promoted product improvement through the use of statistical process control[8]​ around the time Waloddi Weibull was working on statistical models for fatigue. The development of reliability engineering was here on a parallel path with quality. The modern use of the word reliability was defined by the US military in the 1940s, characterizing a product that would operate when expected and for a specific period of time.

In World War II, many reliability problems were due to the inherent unreliability of the electronic equipment available at the time and fatigue problems. In 1945, MA Miner published the seminal paper titled “Cumulative Damage in Fatigue” in an ASME journal. A major application of reliability engineering in the military was the vacuum tube used in radar systems and other electronic components, for which reliability proved to be very problematic and expensive. The IEEE formed the Reliability Society in 1948. In 1950, the United States Department of Defense formed a group called the Advisory Group on the Reliability of Electronic Equipment (AGREE) to investigate reliability methods for military equipment.[9] This group recommended three main ways of working:

In the 1960s, more emphasis was placed on reliability testing at the component and system levels. The famous military standard MIL-STD-781 was created at that time. Around this period, the RCA also published the much-used predecessor to Military Manual 217, which was used to predict failure rates of electronic components. Emphasis on component-only reliability and empirical research (e.g. Mil Std 217) slowly declined. More pragmatic approaches were being used, as used in consumer industries. In the 1980s, televisions were increasingly composed of solid-state semiconductors. Automobiles rapidly increased their use of semiconductors with a variety of microcomputers under the hood and in the dashboard. Large air conditioning systems developed electronic controllers, like those already found in microwave ovens and a variety of other appliances. Communications systems began to adopt electronics to replace older mechanical switching systems. Bellcore") issued the first consumer prediction methodology for telecommunications, and SAE developed a similar document (SAE870050) for automotive applications. The nature of the predictions evolved during the decade, and it became clear that die complexity was not the only factor determining integrated circuit (IC) failure rates. Kam Wong published a paper questioning the bathtub curve[10]—see also reliability-centered maintenance. During this decade, the failure rate of many components was reduced by a factor of 10. Software became important to system reliability. In the 1990s, the pace of integrated circuit development was accelerating. Wider use of standalone microcomputers was common, and the PC market helped keep IC densities following Moore's law and doubling every 18 months. Reliability engineering was now changing as it moved toward understanding the physics of failure rates. of component failures continued to fall, but system-level problems became more prominent. For software, the CMM (Capability Maturity Model) was developed, which gave a more qualitative approach to reliability. ISO 9000 added reliability measures as part of the design and development part of the certification. The expansion of the World-Wide Web created new security and trust challenges. questionable. Consumer reliability issues could now be discussed online in real time using data. New technologies such as microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), handheld GPS, and handheld devices that combine mobile phones and computers presented challenges to maintaining reliability during this decade and what had been done in three years was being done in 18 months. This meant that reliability tools and tasks had to be more closely linked to the development process itself. Reliability became part of daily life and consumer expectations.

Structural reliability is the science of applying reliability theory to structures, which is becoming popular in structural engineering.[11]​[12]​ Many modern building and structural calculation codes are based on the fact that materials have a certain statistical variability, in addition to the fact that the actions or forces on structural systems are only known with a certain degree of precision, so a safe design should start from probabilistic or probable values ​​for said actions or forces. In particular, the limit state method is a structural reliability method based on probabilistic notions and estimates of failure probabilities.

The English word reliability ('reliability') dates back to 1816 and is first attributed to the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge.[7] Before World War II, the term was mainly linked to repeatability; A test (in any type of science) was considered "reliable" if the same results were obtained repeatedly. In the 1920s, Dr. Walter A. Shewhart of Bell Labs promoted product improvement through the use of statistical process control[8]​ around the time Waloddi Weibull was working on statistical models for fatigue. The development of reliability engineering was here on a parallel path with quality. The modern use of the word reliability was defined by the US military in the 1940s, characterizing a product that would operate when expected and for a specific period of time.

In World War II, many reliability problems were due to the inherent unreliability of the electronic equipment available at the time and fatigue problems. In 1945, MA Miner published the seminal paper titled “Cumulative Damage in Fatigue” in an ASME journal. A major application of reliability engineering in the military was the vacuum tube used in radar systems and other electronic components, for which reliability proved to be very problematic and expensive. The IEEE formed the Reliability Society in 1948. In 1950, the United States Department of Defense formed a group called the Advisory Group on the Reliability of Electronic Equipment (AGREE) to investigate reliability methods for military equipment.[9] This group recommended three main ways of working:

In the 1960s, more emphasis was placed on reliability testing at the component and system levels. The famous military standard MIL-STD-781 was created at that time. Around this period, the RCA also published the much-used predecessor to Military Manual 217, which was used to predict failure rates of electronic components. Emphasis on component-only reliability and empirical research (e.g. Mil Std 217) slowly declined. More pragmatic approaches were being used, as used in consumer industries. In the 1980s, televisions were increasingly composed of solid-state semiconductors. Automobiles rapidly increased their use of semiconductors with a variety of microcomputers under the hood and in the dashboard. Large air conditioning systems developed electronic controllers, like those already found in microwave ovens and a variety of other appliances. Communications systems began to adopt electronics to replace older mechanical switching systems. Bellcore") issued the first consumer prediction methodology for telecommunications, and SAE developed a similar document (SAE870050) for automotive applications. The nature of the predictions evolved during the decade, and it became clear that die complexity was not the only factor determining integrated circuit (IC) failure rates. Kam Wong published a paper questioning the bathtub curve[10]—see also reliability-centered maintenance. During this decade, the failure rate of many components was reduced by a factor of 10. Software became important to system reliability. In the 1990s, the pace of integrated circuit development was accelerating. Wider use of standalone microcomputers was common, and the PC market helped keep IC densities following Moore's law and doubling every 18 months. Reliability engineering was now changing as it moved toward understanding the physics of failure rates. of component failures continued to fall, but system-level problems became more prominent. For software, the CMM (Capability Maturity Model) was developed, which gave a more qualitative approach to reliability. ISO 9000 added reliability measures as part of the design and development part of the certification. The expansion of the World-Wide Web created new security and trust challenges. questionable. Consumer reliability issues could now be discussed online in real time using data. New technologies such as microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), handheld GPS, and handheld devices that combine mobile phones and computers presented challenges to maintaining reliability during this decade and what had been done in three years was being done in 18 months. This meant that reliability tools and tasks had to be more closely linked to the development process itself. Reliability became part of daily life and consumer expectations.

Structural reliability is the science of applying reliability theory to structures, which is becoming popular in structural engineering.[11]​[12]​ Many modern building and structural calculation codes are based on the fact that materials have a certain statistical variability, in addition to the fact that the actions or forces on structural systems are only known with a certain degree of precision, so a safe design should start from probabilistic or probable values ​​for said actions or forces. In particular, the limit state method is a structural reliability method based on probabilistic notions and estimates of failure probabilities.