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Understanding coastal retreat
Over half of global coastal settlements are retreating inland due to intensifying climate risks.
14 December 2025
In 2025, climate change fuelled extreme weather across the world, worsening heatwaves, droughts, storms and wildfires, and pushing millions close to the ‘limits of adaptation’, according to World Weather Attribution’s annual report.
The report underscores that global temperatures were exceptionally high throughout the year.
While natural modes like El Niño Southern Oscillation were in a cooler phase, global warming made 2025 one of the warmest years on record.
Heatwaves have become measurably more intense since the Paris Agreement was signed, with some events now up to 10 times more likely to happen than in 2015.
Extreme weather disproportionally affects vulnerable groups and marginalised communities. This inequality is also seen in climate science, where lack of data and limitations in climate models constrain analyses for Global South events.
Reducing vulnerability and exposure of the population saves lives, but some extreme events in 2025 showed that climate change is already pushing millions close to the ‘limits of adaptation’
Drastically reducing fossil fuel emissions remains the key policy to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, the report states.
‘Each year, the risks of climate change become less hypothetical and more brutal reality. Our report shows that despite efforts to cut carbon emissions, they have fallen short in preventing global temperature rise and the worst impacts. Decision-makers must face the reality that their continued reliance on fossil fuels is costing lives, billions in economic losses, and causing irreversible damage to communities worldwide.’
FRIEDERIKE OTTO
Professor in climate science at the Centre for Environmental Policy at Imperial College London and co-founder of World Weather Attribution
Human-induced climate change continued to bring devastating extreme weather events in 2025. Despite being a year with La Niña conditions – a feature that is usually associated with colder equatorial Pacific ocean waters and milder global temperatures – this year will still be one of the hottest three ever recorded.
The three-year average will also cross the 1.5°C threshold for the first time.
The rapid studies conducted by World Weather Attribution this year highlight the consequences of this warming.
Most extreme weather events analysed by the group showed the fingerprints of climate change.
The analyses also show that, for every extreme event, vulnerable populations are systematically the hardest hit.
In 2025, World Weather Attribution identified 157 extreme weather events that met a set of criteria of humanitarian impact.
Floods and heatwaves were the most frequent occurrences, with 49 events each, followed by storms (38), wildfires (11), droughts (7) and cold spells (3).
The team studied 22 of those events in-depth: three in Africa, seven in the Americas, five in Asia, six in Europe and one in Oceania.
Of those, 17 were made more severe or more likely due to climate change and five had inconclusive results, mostly due to lack of weather data and limitations in climate models.
The scientists also revisited six previous heat events for a report looking at how extreme heat has become more frequent and intense since the signing of the Paris Agreement.
Since 2015 global warming has increased 0.3ºC, but some heatwaves have become almost 10 times more likely – more evidence that when it comes to climate change, every fraction of a degree matters.
‘2025 showed us that we are now in a persistent new era of dangerous, extreme weather. This year we have also seen a slide into climate inaction, and the defunding of important climate information initiatives. The evidence of the severe, real impacts of climate change are more clear than ever, and it is essential that action is taken to stop fossil fuel emissions, and to help the world’s most vulnerable to prepare for the devastating impacts of increasingly extreme weather.
‘Our research throughout the year has consistently highlighted how climate change is fuelling more frequent and severe extreme weather events. As we look back on the past 12 months, the evidence is undeniable: catastrophic wildfires, record-breaking rainfall, unprecedented temperatures, and devastating hurricanes and typhoons. All of these events are signs of a rapidly changing environment.’
THEODORE KEEPING
Researcher at Imperial College London
Heatwaves were the deadliest extreme weather events of 2025. While most heat-related deaths remain unreported, one study estimated that 24,400 died from a single summer heatwave in Europe this year.
Other WWA studies published in 2025 showed that human-induced climate change intensified heatwaves in South Sudan, Burkina Faso, Norway, Sweden, Mexico, Argentina and England.
Tropical cyclones and storms were also among the deadliest events of the year. One of the worst examples happened recently, when several simultaneous storms hit Asia and Southeast Asia, killing more than 1,700 people and causing billions in damages.
Just a few weeks before, Hurricane Melissa left a trail of destruction in Jamaica. WWA’s work showed that climate change made the rainfall associated with these storms more likely and intense.
Analysis by Climate Central showed that climate change made all 2025 season Atlantic hurricanes at least 9mph (about 14km/h) stronger.
Even though that is about a 10% increase in the intensity, this can mean a much larger increase in damages, e.g. a 44% increase, as research on Hurricane Helene in 2024 showed.
Many regions, including central Africa, western Australia, central Brazil, Canada and large parts of the Middle East, experienced some of their driest years on record.
These extreme droughts led to water shortages, crop failures and the worsening of wildfire conditions.
Four wildfires were studied in total. While individual fires can be ignited by people or natural causes such as lightning, the likelihood of major fires, such as those in Palisades, Los Angeles and Southern Spain, was significantly increased by climate change.
As extreme weather events grow more frequent and intense, the need for urgent and rapid action has never been clearer.
Despite existing efforts to adapt, these events have continued to cause devastating loss of life and billions in economic damages in 2025.
To mitigate these impacts and reduce future risks in 2026 and beyond, a rapid transition away from fossil fuels is critical.
‘In 2026, every country needs to do more, to prepare for the escalating threat of extreme weather and to commit to the swift replacement of fossil fuels and avoid further devastation. There is nothing in natural climate models that can explain why 2025 was this hot. While factors like El Niño can cause temporary fluctuations in global temperatures, they still don’t explain the sustained warmth we saw this year.
‘The continuous rise in greenhouse gas emissions has pushed our climate into a new, more extreme state, where even small increases in global temperatures now trigger disproportionately severe impacts.
‘These heatwaves, storms and rainfall events we are witnessing today are far beyond what natural variability would predict. We are entering a new era of climate extremes, where what was once an anomaly is quickly becoming the norm.’
SJOUKJE PHILIP
Researcher at the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI)
Over half of global coastal settlements are retreating inland due to intensifying climate risks.
2025’s Adaptation Gap Report reveals slow climate adaptation is threatening lives and economies.
Rich nations profit from the climate crisis, with two-thirds of climate finance for the global south handed out as loans.
Global media failing to report wildfire in areas where impacts are greatest.
