The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) released the Living Planet Report 2026, titled The Science of Hope, on 7 October 2026 in partnership with the Zoological Society of London (ZSL). The report finds that the average size of 35,803 monitored wildlife populations of 5,790 vertebrate species fell by 73 percent between 1970 and 2022. Freshwater populations fell the sharpest at 85 percent, while populations in Latin America and the Caribbean fell by 95 percent.
What Is the Living Planet Report and Living Planet Index?
The Living Planet Report is a biennial scientific assessment published by WWF in collaboration with ZSL. It tracks global biodiversity using the Living Planet Index, which measures average change in size of monitored populations of mammals, birds, fish, reptiles and amphibians since 1970.
The Living Planet Report (LPR) has been published every two years for nearly three decades. It is widely treated as a leading science based assessment of the health of nature. The 2026 edition, titled The Science of Hope, was released on 7 October 2026. The previous edition in 2024 was titled A System in Peril.
The Living Planet Index (LPI) is produced and managed by the Zoological Society of London. The LPI is not a census of all wild animals on Earth. It works like a stock market index for wildlife. It tracks the average proportional change in the size of specific animal groups, called populations, that scientists monitor at the same location over time. A population here means animals of one species counted in one place using the same method across years.
The 2026 LPI is based on the largest dataset used so far. It includes 35,803 population trends covering 5,790 vertebrate species, drawn from more than 3,500 sources such as scientific papers, databases and government monitoring records. The index starts with a baseline value of 1 in 1970 and calculates change up to 2022, a span of 52 years. The method uses a geometric mean and applies diversity weighting to correct for gaps, because birds and mammals in Europe and North America are monitored far more closely than amphibians or fish in tropical regions.
Key Findings of the Living Planet Report 2026
The Living Planet Report 2026 reports an average decline of 73 percent in the size of monitored vertebrate populations between 1970 and 2022. The decline represents an average annual fall of about 2.5 percent per year. Statistical testing places the overall fall between 67 percent and 78 percent with 95 percent confidence. Successive editions of the index are not directly comparable because each edition adds new species and extends the period, with 967 more populations and 295 more species added since the 2024 report.
The 73 percent figure needs careful reading. It does not mean that 73 of every 100 wild animals have disappeared. It also does not mean that 73 percent of populations were wiped out. The report states that 50 percent of monitored populations are declining, while the other half are stable (7 percent) or increasing (43 percent). The global average is still deeply negative because the size of the falls in declining populations is much larger than the size of the gains in recovering populations.
Declines differ sharply by ecosystem. Freshwater systems show the worst result, followed by land and then oceans.
| Ecosystem | Average Change Between 1970 and 2022 |
|---|---|
| Freshwater | 85 percent decline |
| Terrestrial | 69 percent decline |
| Marine | 59 percent decline |
Declines also differ sharply by region. The report presents results by groupings used by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), a global body that assesses biodiversity for policy makers.
| Region | Average Change Between 1970 and 2022 |
|---|---|
| Latin America and the Caribbean | 95 percent decline |
| Africa | 80 percent decline |
| Asia and the Pacific | 49 percent decline |
| North America | 28 percent decline |
| Europe and Central Asia | 23 percent decline |
The smaller declines in Europe and North America do not mean nature is safer there. Large scale damage in these regions had already happened before the 1970 baseline, so the index starts counting after much loss had occurred. In contrast, tropical regions hold far more species and have faced rapid habitat conversion during the study period.
What Is Biodiversity Loss and What Causes It?
Biodiversity loss means a fall in the variety and abundance of life on Earth, including fewer individuals within species, fewer species in an area, and damage to ecosystems. It weakens food, water and climate systems on which people depend for survival.
Biodiversity is the variety of life at three levels. These are genetic diversity within a species, species diversity across plants and animals, and ecosystem diversity across forests, rivers, wetlands and oceans. The LPI measures one part of this picture, which is change in abundance, or how population sizes rise or fall. Other measures complete the picture. The Red List Index tracks change in extinction risk, while the Biodiversity Intactness Index estimates how much of a region’s original wildlife remains compared with pre industrial conditions.
The Living Planet Report 2026 finds that habitat loss and degradation is the most frequently reported threat to monitored populations. Habitat degradation means the decline in quality of the place where a species lives, through deforestation, wetland drainage, river fragmentation, pollution or unsustainable farming. Habitat fragmentation, where large habitats are broken into small isolated patches, makes the problem worse because animals cannot move, feed or breed normally.
Other major drivers act together with habitat loss. These include overuse of species through overfishing and hunting, climate change, pollution from nutrients, pesticides and plastics, and invasive alien species that prey on or compete with native wildlife. Agriculture alone accounts for 70 to 80 percent of tropical deforestation and about 70 percent of global freshwater use. The report notes that energy, food and finance systems sit behind these pressures, because fossil fuel use drives climate change, food production converts natural land, and financial flows continue to fund activities that damage nature.
Why Freshwater Populations Recorded the Sharpest Fall
The Living Planet Report 2026 records an 85 percent average decline in freshwater populations, the steepest fall among all systems. Freshwater vertebrates tracked in the index include fish, amphibians, reptiles such as turtles, mammals such as river dolphins, and waterbirds. The fall continues a long pattern, as earlier editions also placed freshwater losses well above land and ocean losses.
Freshwater ecosystems are small but exceptionally rich. Lakes, rivers, streams and wetlands cover only about 2.3 percent of Earth’s surface yet host at least 9.5 percent of described animal species, including one third of all vertebrate species. They are also islands of water inside land. A fish in one river basin usually cannot move to another basin, so loss of one wetland or river stretch can wipe out a local population completely.
Several pressures hit fresh water harder than other systems. Dams and barrages block migration and change seasonal flows that fish need for breeding. Water withdrawal for farming and cities lowers river levels and dries wetlands. Pollution from farms, factories and cities reduces oxygen and poisons breeding grounds. Sand mining destroys river beds, while invasive fish spread quickly through connected canals and reservoirs. About 30 percent of natural freshwater ecosystems are estimated to have disappeared since 1970, and wetlands are vanishing about three times faster than forests. The report therefore treats river connectivity, clean flows and habitat protection as urgent priorities for freshwater recovery.
Why Latin America and the Caribbean Recorded a 95 Percent Decline
The Living Planet Report 2026 places the steepest regional fall in Latin America and the Caribbean, where monitored populations fell by an average of 95 percent between 1970 and 2022. Africa follows with an 80 percent fall, and Asia and the Pacific records a 49 percent fall. The dataset for Latin America and the Caribbean grew by about 20 percent in populations in this edition, mainly through new monitoring data from protected areas in Brazil, which makes the trend more robust.
The scale of the fall reflects the region’s exceptional richness and rapid land conversion. The region holds the Amazon rainforest, the world’s largest tropical forest, along with vast wetlands, savannas and coral systems. These areas support very high numbers of amphibians, reptiles and freshwater fish, the groups with the most negative trends in the region. Expansion of soy farming, cattle ranching, logging and mining has cleared and fragmented large forest areas over the study period. Changes in rivers through dams and pollution have added pressure on freshwater species.
The result is not uniform across species. Birds and mammals in the region show less severe average falls than amphibians, reptiles and fish. The report cautions that the 95 percent regional average, like the global 73 percent, is an average of proportional change and hides stable or recovering populations within the same landscape. It also reflects the weighting method, which gives more weight to species rich tropical groups that are declining fast.
The Science of Hope: Recovery Stories and Positive Tipping Points
The 2026 report uses the subtitle The Science of Hope to argue that decline is not fixed and recovery is measurable. The report points to green sea turtles, bluefin tuna, tigers and southern African elephants as proof that long term action can reverse steep falls. Green turtle nesting has risen by nearly 30 percent at monitored sites after decades of beach protection, safer fishing gear and international cooperation. Bluefin tuna stocks have started recovering after stricter catch limits and better monitoring. Nepal became the first tiger range country to meet the global TX2 goal of doubling wild tigers, while India, home to most wild tigers, doubled its tiger numbers through habitat protection and anti poaching work.
These recoveries share common features. They lasted for decades, combined local community control with national policy, and protected both animals and their habitats. In southern Africa, elephant numbers stabilised where local communities share authority over wildlife and receive direct benefits. In the Amazon, the Amazon Soy Moratorium largely stopped conversion of newly cleared forest into soy fields, even as soy output kept rising. The Amazon Region Protected Areas programme, known as ARPA, has helped safeguard more than 150 million acres of rainforest in Brazil for almost 25 years.
The report links these species wins to a wider idea of positive tipping points. A negative tipping point is a threshold after which collapse becomes self reinforcing, such as coral die off or Amazon dieback. A positive tipping point works in reverse. Once enough people, firms and governments adopt a cleaner option, change becomes faster, cheaper and harder to reverse. Solar power has already crossed such a point and is now the cheapest source of new electricity in most countries. The report argues that food systems could reach a similar point within two to ten years through nature positive farming, healthier diets and less waste, while finance still needs stronger rules on disclosure, harmful subsidies and nature risk.
Who Publishes the Report: WWF and Zoological Society of London
The World Wide Fund for Nature, known by the acronym WWF, publishes the Living Planet Report. WWF was conceived on 29 April 1961 and opened its first office in September 1961 in Morges, Switzerland. It is an independent foundation registered under Swiss law, with its international secretariat now based in Gland, Switzerland. WWF originally stood for World Wildlife Fund. In 1986 it changed its full name to World Wide Fund for Nature to reflect wider work on forests, climate and pollution, while the United States and Canada retained the older name. WWF now works in nearly 100 countries and supports thousands of conservation projects.
The index behind the report is produced by the Zoological Society of London (ZSL). ZSL was founded in 1826 by figures including Sir Stamford Raffles and is based at Regent’s Park in London. It is a science led conservation charity that runs London Zoo and Whipsnade Zoo and carries out research through its Institute of Zoology. The LPI team at the institute curates the Living Planet Database, which now holds time series for more than 40,000 populations of mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, amphibians and butterflies. The database is updated continuously and published alongside each report, with methods that are peer reviewed and open for scrutiny. WWF India, the national arm operating under Indian law, connects this global work to conservation programmes within India.
The Way Forward: Halting and Reversing Loss by 2030
The Living Planet Report 2026 places its findings within the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, a global plan adopted in December 2022 under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). Nearly every country agreed to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030 and to live in harmony with nature by 2050. The framework sets 4 goals for 2050 and 23 action targets for 2030, including restoration of 30 percent of degraded ecosystems and conservation of 30 percent of land, inland waters and seas through protected areas and community conserved areas.
The report warns that current action is not yet at the scale needed. It calls for three shifts. First, national commitments should reflect each country’s full global footprint, including deforestation or water loss driven by its consumption in other countries. Second, governments must use tools that only they control, such as subsidy reform, public procurement, tax policy and mandatory disclosure of nature risk by banks and firms. The report notes an annual biodiversity finance gap of $942 billion. Third, businesses, cities, civil groups and Indigenous Peoples must act together, with secure land rights and long term funding for stewards of rich biodiversity.
For target tracking, the Living Planet Index serves as a complementary indicator for the framework’s goals on species abundance and extinction risk. The report stresses that conservation alone cannot reverse the trend without changing energy, food and finance drivers. If food and finance cross positive tipping points in this decade, the same economic and social forces that now speed up loss could start to speed up recovery before 2030.
Key Takeaways
- The Living Planet Report 2026, titled The Science of Hope, was released on 7 October 2026 by WWF with the Zoological Society of London.
- The Living Planet Index covers 35,803 populations of 5,790 vertebrate species and shows a 73 percent average decline between 1970 and 2022.
- Freshwater populations fell by 85 percent, the sharpest fall, followed by terrestrial at 69 percent and marine at 59 percent.
- Latin America and the Caribbean recorded a 95 percent decline, followed by Africa at 80 percent and Asia and the Pacific at 49 percent.
- WWF was conceived in 1961 and is headquartered in Gland, Switzerland, while ZSL was founded in 1826 and is based in London.
- The report links recovery to the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which aims to halt and reverse loss by 2030 and conserve 30 percent of land and seas.
