DISPROVED
This has been solved in the negative.
- $25
We say $H$ is a unique subgraph of $G$ if there is exactly one way to find $H$ as a subgraph (not necessarily induced) of $G$. Is there a graph on $n$ vertices with\[\gg \frac{2^{\binom{n}{2}}}{n!}\]many distinct unique subgraphs?
A problem of Erdős and Entringer
[EnEr72], who constructed a graph with\[\gg 2^{\binom{n}{2}-O(n^{3/2+o(1)})}\]many unique subgraphs. This was improved by Harary and Schwenk
[HaSc73] and then by Brouwer
[Br75], who constructed a graph with\[\gg \frac{2^{\binom{n}{2}-O(n)}}{n!}\]many unique subgraphs.
Note that there are $\sim 2^{\binom{n}{2}}/n!$ many non-isomorphic graphs on $n$ vertices (folklore, often attributed to Pólya), and hence the bound in the problem statement is trivially best possible.
Erdős believed Brouwer's construction was essentially best possible, but Spencer suggested that $\gg \frac{2^{\binom{n}{2}}}{n!}$ may be possible. Erdős offered \$100 for such a construction and \$25 for a proof that no such construction is possible.
Bradač and Christoph
[BrCh24] have proved the answer is no: if $f(n)$ is the maximum number of unique subgraphs in a graph on $n$ vertices then\[f(n) = o\left(\frac{2^{\binom{n}{2}}}{n!}\right).\](Quantitatively the $o(1)$ in their argument can be taken to be $O(\frac{\log\log\log n}{\log\log n})$.)
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T. F. Bloom, Erdős Problem #426, https://www.erdosproblems.com/426, accessed 2026-01-16