Short answerNot settled
One study in 2019 reported that bees trained to associate colours with adding one or subtracting one performed above chance. No other group has replicated it, and there is no formal published rebuttal aimed at it — what exists is cautious disagreement about whether the design excludes simpler strategies. HoneyHQ describes what was reported and does not state that bees can do arithmetic.
The study was widely reported as bees doing maths, which is what the paper's own framing invited. The design is ingenious; the inferential distance between the data and the headline is the problem.
Bees were trained in a Y-maze. A sample display of shapes appeared in one colour, which signalled add one, or another colour, which signalled subtract one. The bee then chose between two displays, one of which was the correct answer. Performance was reported above chance.
If it holds, it would mean an insect holding a quantity in working memory and operating on it according to a symbolic instruction. That would be a genuinely remarkable result and it is why the study attracted the coverage it did.
Widely repeated and not supported by current evidence. Listed so the correction is here rather than only the claim.
Reported in one study in 2019 and not independently replicated by any other group. No formal published rebuttal targets it directly; the disagreement in the field is about whether the design excludes simpler strategies, and the closely related zero result does have a named published critique. Listed because the claim is in wide circulation, not because this site holds it.
How sources are selected and weighted is set out in the sources and evidence policy.
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