Global warming reached 1.37°C in 2025, climate indicators report finds

Human-caused global warming reached 1.37°C above the 1850–1900 baseline in 2025, according to the “Indicators of Global Climate Change 2025” report published on June 11, 2026 in the journal “Earth System Science Data”. The annual assessment, led by Professor Piers Forster of the Priestley Centre for Climate Futures at the University of Leeds and compiled by more than 70 scientists from 56 institutions across 17 countries, reports that the rate of warming holds at about 0.27°C per decade and that the remaining carbon budget for a 50% chance of limiting warming to 1.5°C has fallen to 130 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide — close to three years of current emissions.

What the global warming update measured

The report tracks a set of physical indicators of the climate system and of human influence, updating them each year between the larger assessments of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It finds that 2025 was the third warmest year on record and that natural variability had a limited effect on last year’s global mean temperature, leaving human activity as the dominant driver.

A central measure is the Earth’s energy imbalance, which gauges how fast heat is accumulating in the climate system. The report states this imbalance is at a record high and has doubled in recent decades. Dr Samantha Burgess of the Copernicus Climate Change Service at ECMWF said the study shows “nearly all of the warming over the last decade is driven by human activities.” The update also records global greenhouse gas emissions at an all-time high of 56.8 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂e) in 2024, mainly from burning fossil fuels.

Source: “Indicators of Global Climate Change 2025”, Earth System Science Data (2026).

Greenhouse gas concentrations and the shrinking carbon budget

Atmospheric concentrations of the three main greenhouse gases each rose again in 2025. Carbon dioxide reached 425.6 parts per million (ppm), methane 1,936.3 parts per billion (ppb), and nitrous oxide 339.4 ppb. Since 2019, carbon dioxide has risen by 15.6 ppm, methane by 70.0 ppb, and nitrous oxide by 7.2 ppb.

Source: “Indicators of Global Climate Change 2025”, Earth System Science Data (2026).

The report puts the remaining carbon budget for a 50% chance of holding warming below 1.5°C at 130 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide from the start of 2026. At current carbon dioxide emissions of about 42 billion tonnes a year, it states this budget would be exhausted in around three years. If emissions continue at present levels, the report projects warming to reach 1.5°C around 2030.

Sea level, marine heatwaves and temperature extremes

Global sea level reached a record 23 cm of rise since 1901, at a long-term rate of about 1.8 mm per year that the report states is accelerating with higher ocean temperatures and melting land ice. A newly added indicator, the number of days with marine heatwaves, recorded 65 such days globally in 2025; the report says these have more than tripled worldwide between 1991 and 2025. On land, the average maximum temperature for the hottest day of the year reached 1.92°C above pre-industrial levels over 2016–2025, an increase of 0.49°C compared with 2006–2015, while the most recent decade was 0.32°C warmer than the one before it.

The report frames these measures as evidence of continued, human-driven change across the climate system, and stresses the need to keep the global observation datasets that underpin the indicators. Dr Chris Smith of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis noted the edition drew on more than 40 global datasets, “many of which are now threatened by funding decisions.”

Winss Solutions has tracked the wider sustainability picture in its round-up of sustainability news from January 19 to February 8, 2026 and in its overview of 24 sustainability trends to watch in 2025 and 2026. The decarbonisation the report calls for rests on the energy transition examined in whether renewable energy is really unreliable due to intermittency.

Background

The Indicators of Global Climate Change project began as a way to keep the IPCC’s headline climate metrics current between its multi-year assessment reports, using the same datasets and methods so that policymakers can read year-on-year change on a consistent basis. Earlier editions added indicators such as sea-level rise and land precipitation; this year’s edition introduces marine heatwave days and again draws on an international author team that includes IPCC lead authors. By reporting human-induced warming of 1.37°C and a 1.5°C carbon budget of close to three years, the 2025 update sets out how far the climate has moved since the last full IPCC assessment and how little room remains under the Paris Agreement’s lower temperature limit.

Sources: Earth System Science Data; Priestley Centre for Climate Futures, University of Leeds; Indicators of Global Climate Change (Copernicus)

Featured image: photo by Balázs Gábor on Pexels (free Pexels license).

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Figen Sekin

I specialize in sustainability education, curriculum co-creation, and early-stage project strategy. At WINSS, I craft articles on sustainability, transformative AI, and related topics. When I’m not writing, you’ll find me chasing the perfect sushi roll, exploring cities around the globe, or unwinding with my dog Puffy — the world’s most loyal sidekick.