The term was first used in "Rough Justice", a story credited to both Alan Moore and Alan Davis published in July 1983 by Marvel UK in the anthology comicThe Daredevils. Saturnyne uses the term to differentiate Brian Braddock, the Captain Britain of the regular Marvel Comics universe, from the other members of the Captain Britain Corps, each of which inhabit different universes. The designation was later used by the American branch of Marvel Comics in the Excalibur title, which frequently referenced Captain Britain's early UK-published adventures. This comic was written by Chris Claremont, who had created Captain Britain, and pencilled by Alan Davis, the artist on the UK-published series. Davis later had a run as both writer and artist on the book. Alan Moore is usually credited with creating the term. However, Alan Davis has said that it was invented by Dave Thorpe, the previous writer of the UK-published Captain Britain stories. A difference of opinion exists regarding the selection of the number 616. In 2005, Moore's son-in-law John Reppion said on an Internet message board that the number was arbitrarily chosen by Moore, saying it "was just a random number of no significance chosen because people always seemed to be talking about 'earth 2' or 'earth 4' but never any higher numbers." However, Davis has said that it comes from a variation on the Number of the Beast, picked because Thorpe "wasn't a fan of the modern superhero genre" and expressed this in his stories, "such as recording his opinion of the Marvel Universe with the designation 616." In the climaxes of the "Goblin Nation" and "Spider-Verse" storylines in Superior Spider-Man and The Amazing Spider-Man, respectively, it is revealed that Marvel 2099/Earth-928 is the same universe as 616, dubbed as Earth-616 circa 2099.
In the film ', Erik Selvig is portrayed as being somewhat mentally unstable and in his time at a mental hospital he draws a number of diagrams and equations on a blackboard. Near the center of all of this, the words "616 universe" can be seen underlined.
In the film ', Mysterio claims that the main Marvel Cinematic Universe continuity exists on "Earth-616".
In the film , Earth-616 is seen in a monitor along with other Earths, while Peter B. Parker arrives on Earth-1610 when the interdimensional machine starts malfunctioning.
