The initial concept dates back to 1897, when English engineer Frederick W. Lanchester patented wing end-plates as a method for controlling wingtip vortices. In the United States, Scottish-born engineer William E. Somerville patented the first functional winglets in 1910, installing them on his early biplane and monoplane designs. Simple flat end-plates did not reduce drag, because the increase in profile drag was greater than the decrease in induced drag.
Following the end of World War II, Dr. Sighard F. Hoerner was a pioneer researcher in the field, publishing a technical paper in 1952 that called for drooped wingtips whose pointed rear tips focused the resulting wingtip vortex away from the upper wing surface. Drooped wingtips are often called "Hoerner tips" in his honor. The earliest-known implementation of a Hoerner-style downward-angled wingtip device on a jet aircraft was during World War II, on the Lippisch-Ohren of the Heinkel He 162A Spatz jet light fighter, added to counteract a dutch roll characteristic.
The term "winglet" was previously used to describe an additional lifting surface on an aircraft. Richard Whitcomb’s research in the 1970s at NASA first used "winglet" with its modern meaning, referring to a near-vertical extension of the wing tips. Winglets and wingtip fences increase efficiency by reducing vortex interference with laminar airflow near the wingtips, by ‘moving’ the confluence of low-pressure and high-pressure air away from the wing surface.
Richard T. Whitcomb, an engineer at NASA's Langley Research Center, further developed Hoerner's concept after the 1973 oil crisis. He showed that, for a given bending moment, a near-vertical winglet offers a greater drag reduction compared to a horizontal span extension. Whitcomb was the first to realize a net benefit in drag reduction by careful design to keep profile drag to a minimum. Flight tests were conducted in 1979–80 by a joint NASA/Air Force team, using a KC-135 Stratotanker, a Lockheed L-1011, and a McDonnell Douglas DC-10, with the latter design directly implemented on the MD-11, rolled out in 1990.
Learjet exhibited the prototype Learjet 28 at the 1977 National Business Aviation Association convention, employing the first winglets ever used on a production aircraft. Flight tests showed that the winglets increased range by about 6.5 percent and improved directional stability. Gulfstream Aerospace incorporated winglets in the Gulfstream III, IV and V, with the Gulfstream V range of 6,500 nmi allowing nonstop routes such as New York–Tokyo. Burt Rutan combined winglets and vertical stabilizers on his Beechcraft Starship business aircraft design that first flew in 1986.
Wingtip fences, including surfaces extending both above and below the wingtip, were first used on the Airbus A310-300 in 1985. Other Airbus models followed with the A300-600, the A320ceo, and the A380. The Ilyushin Il-96 was the first Russian and modern jet to feature winglets in 1988. The Boeing 747-400, announced in 1985, used a combination of winglets and increased span to carry additional load, increasing range by 3.5% over the 747-300.
Blended winglets, attached to the wing with a smooth curve, were announced as an option for the Boeing 737-800 in 2000. Aviation Partners develops blended winglets as retrofits for the Gulfstream II, Hawker 800 and the Falcon 2000. These extensions decrease fuel consumption by 4% for long-range flights and increase range by 130 or 200 nmi for the 737-800. Airbus launched its "Sharklet" blended winglet in 2009, designed to enhance the payload-range of its A320 family and reduce fuel burn by up to 4% over longer sectors.
Raked wingtips, where the tip has a greater wing sweep than the rest of the wing, are featured on some Boeing Commercial Airplanes and Embraer aircraft. In testing by Boeing and NASA, they reduce drag by as much as 5.5%, compared to 3.5% to 4.5% for conventional winglets. Raked wingtips are installed on the Boeing 767-400ER, -200LR/-300ER/F variants of Boeing 777, the Boeing 787, the Boeing 747-8, and the Embraer E-jet E2 and C-390 Millennium wings.
The McDonnell Douglas MD-11 was the first aircraft with split-tip winglets in 1990. Aviation Partners has introduced a similar design to the 737 MAX wingtip device known as the split scimitar winglet.
In gliders, Peter Masak and Mark D. Maughmer developed successful winglet designs for gliding competitions, using a new PSU–90–125 airfoil. At the 1991 World Gliding Championships, a winglet-equipped glider won the highest speed trophy. Within 10 years of their introduction, most high-performance gliders were equipped with winglets.
Tamarack Aerospace Group has patented an Active Technology Load Alleviation System (ATLAS), a modified version of a wingtip device, using movable panels to aerodynamically "switch off" the effects of the wingtip device during high-g events.
Wingtip devices are also used on rotating propeller, helicopter rotor, and wind turbine blades. The AgustaWestland AW101’s rotor blades have a distinctive tip shape that alters the downwash field and reduces brownout. Hartzell Propeller developed their "Q-tip" propeller by bending the blade tips back at a 90-degree angle. Some ceiling fans have wingtip devices.