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In computational complexity theory, the exponential time hypothesis or ETH is an unproven computational hardness assumption that was formulated by Impagliazzo & Paturi (1999). It states that satisfiability of 3-CNF Boolean formulas (3-SAT) cannot be solved in subexponential time, . More precisely, the usual form of the hypothesis asserts the existence of a number such that all algorithms that correctly solve 3-SAT require time at least The exponential time hypothesis, if true, would imply that P ≠ NP, but it is a stronger statement. Beyond NP-complete problems, it implies that many known algorithms have optimal or near-optimal time complexity.