1762 in Scotland

Incumbents

• Monarch – George III
• Prime Minister of Great Britain – John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute from 26 May

  Law officers

• Lord Advocate – Thomas Miller of Glenlee
• Solicitor General for Scotland – James Montgomery jointly with Francis Garden

  Judiciary

• Lord President of the Court of Session – Lord Arniston, the younger
• Lord Justice General – Marquess of Tweeddale to 9 December; then vacant
• Lord Justice Clerk – Lord Tinwald

  Events

• 10 March – William Robertson is elected Principal of the University of Edinburgh, an office which he will hold until his death in 1793, contributing to the Scottish Enlightenment.
• c. April – new building for Perth Academy occupied.
• 5 November – John Watson's Institution established in Edinburgh.
• Admiral John Ross of Balnagowan Castle initiates land tenure reform in the Highlands which will evolve into the Highland Clearances.
• Economic crisis.
• Joseph Black first makes known his discoveries on latent heat, in Glasgow.

  Births

• 31 January – Lachlan Macquarie, British Army officer and Governor of New South Wales
• 2 February – William Balmain, naval surgeon and civil administrator in New South Wales
• 4 February – James Millar, physician and encyclopædist
• 30 April – George Murray, 5th Earl of Dunmore, politician
• 17 July – Alexander Crombie, Presbyterian minister, schoolmaster and philosopher
• 11 September – Joanna Baillie, poet and dramatist
• 28 September – James Horsburgh, hydrographer of the East Indies
• Approximate date – James Bisset, artist, manufacturer, writer, collector, art dealer and poet

  Deaths

• 6 May – Sir Alexander Lindsay, 3rd Baronet
• 9 December – John Hay, 4th Marquess of Tweeddale
• 21 December – Alexander Forbes, 4th Lord Forbes of Pitsligo, Jacobite