This is a timeline documenting the events of heavy metal in the year 1982.

Newly formed bands

• Artillery
• Armored Saint
• Carnivore
• Corrosion of Conformity (not originally a metal band)
• Death Angel
• Destruction
• Dio
• Dirty Rotten Imbeciles
• Exodus
• Kreator
• Napalm Death
• Possessed
• Sodom
• Spinal Tap
• Steve Vai
• Suicidal Tendencies (not originally as a metal band)
• Voivod
• W.A.S.P.
• Warlock
• Warriors
• Watchtower

Albums

• Accept - Restless and Wild
• Aerosmith - Rock in a Hard Place
• Alice Cooper - Zipper Catches Skin
• Billy Idol - Billy Idol
• Black Sabbath - Live Evil
• Diamond Head - Borrowed Time
• Gamma - Gamma 3
• Girlschool - Screaming Blue Murder
• Hanoi Rocks - Oriental Beat
• Iron Maiden - The Number of the Beast
• Jaguar - Power Games
• Judas Priest - Screaming for Vengeance
• Kiss - Creatures of the Night
• Krokus - One Vice at a Time
• Led Zeppelin - Coda (album)(contained unreleased recordings before Bonham's death)
• Loudness - Devil Soldier
• Manowar - Battle Hymns
• Mercyful Fate - Nuns Have No Fun
• Motörhead - Iron Fist
• Rush - Signals
• Sammy Hagar - Three Lock Box
• Samson - Before The Storm
• Scorpions - Blackout
• Sound Barrier - Total Control
• Twisted Sister - Under the Blade
• Van Halen - Diver Down
• Venom - Black Metal
• Whitesnake - Saints & Sinners
• Witchfinder General - Death Penalty
• Y&T - Black Tiger

Events

• Iron Maiden's first album with Bruce Dickinson, The Number of the Beast, becomes one of the first heavy metal album to reach No.1 in the U.K. music charts.
• Motörhead's guitarist "Fast" Eddie Clarke leaves the band and is replaced by ex-Thin Lizzy guitarist Brian Robertson.
• (not released till 1983)Quiet Riot's Metal Health becomes the first heavy metal album to reach No.1 in the Billboard United States music charts and is followed by albums by Van Halen and Mötley Crüe
• Judas Priest's single You've Got Another Thing Comin' becomes the first heavy metal single to break into the Billboard U.S. Top 20 Singles.
• Ozzy Osbourne's guitarist Randy Rhoads dies in an airplane accident on March 19.
• Late that year Iron Maiden's drummer Clive Burr is fired from Maiden due to problems with alcohol and too heavy tour schedules and Nicko McBrain from Trust is hired to replace him. Maiden had now their most legendary line-up.
• Ace Frehley, Space Ace and lead guitarist of Kiss, leaves the band. Vinnie Vincent takes his place.
• Queen departs from their hard rock legacy with the ill-received funk/disco album Hot Space
• Former Deep Purple vocalist Ian Gillan replaces Ronnie James Dio in Black Sabbath
• The band Metallica moves to San Francisco and thus making "resistance" to the Glam Metal

scene in L.A. and forming Bay Area Thrash Metal Scene