Conflicts on rise globally, highest level since WWII, data shows

This aerial photo shows displaced Gazans walking toward Gaza City on January 27, 2025, after crossing the Netzarim corridor from the southern Gaza Strip. AFP via Getty Images hide caption

JOHANNESBURG — If you've been thinking it seems like there are more wars raging in the world these days, it turns out you're right and the data proves it.

A new study by researchers at a university in Sweden recorded the highest number of conflicts between states in 2025 since World War II, and the highest number of fatalities recorded since the Rwandan genocide.

There were 65 active conflicts in 2025, according to researchers at the Uppsala Conflict Data Program (UCDP) at Uppsala University, regarded as a leading source of information on violence worldwide.

Out of that total, the number of direct conflicts between individual states doubled from the previous year to eight in 2025 — the highest number of such conflicts since UCDP began collecting data in 1946.

They included the wars between Russia and Ukraine and between Iran and Israel , as well as conflicts between India and Pakistan , Thailand and Cambodia, and Israel's conflicts in Syria and Yemen. The final two are: the border conflict between Afghanistan and Pakistan , and the conflict in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden between the U.S. and U.K. against Yemen's Houthis .

"We are seeing a clear increase in conflicts between states. For a long time, interstate wars were relatively rare, but developments in recent years point to growing international tensions and a changing global security order," said Shawn Davies, a senior analyst at UCDP.

The rest of the 65 were all intrastate conflicts — government forces fighting rebel groups within the country.