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How did the selection process work when prisoners arrived at Auschwitz-Birkenau?

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Samuel Bak: Smoke — Holocaust *Smoke*, oil on linen by Holocaust survivor Samuel Bak, 1997.

Upon arrival at the Auschwitz-Birkenau complex, prisoners underwent a brutal process known as Selektion (selection) to determine their immediate fate.1

This process was conducted by SS personnel, including camp doctors such as Josef Mengele, who assessed the new arrivals. The division was based on the Nazis' immediate needs for slave labor and their policy of extermination:1

Forced Labor: Those deemed young and able-bodied were selected to be used in slave-labour battalions or industrial facilities, where they were worked to exhaustion under inhumane conditions.21
Extermination: Young children, their mothers, the elderly, and the infirm were sent directly to the gas chambers to be murdered.1

This system was designed to maximize the efficiency of the Holocaust while exploiting victims for the Nazi war effort until they were no longer capable of working, at which point they were typically sent back to Birkenau for gassing. Additionally, some prisoners were selected for horrific medical experiments, which were used to test sterilization methods or study twins in pursuit of Nazi racial goals.21