2020s

The 2020s (pronounced "twenty-twenties" or "two thousand [and] twenties") is the current decade that began on 1 January 2020 and will end on 31 December 2029.

During the early part of this decade, the world population grew from 7.7 billion to then surpass 8 billion people. In 2023, India overtook China to become the most populous country in the world. The COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath marked the early 2020s. The first reports of the virus were published on 31 December 2019, though the first cases are said to have appeared nearly a month earlier. The pandemic led to a global economic recession, sustained rise in global inflation, and supply chain crisis. The World Health Organization declared the virus a global state of emergency. With multiple extreme weather events and ecological crises continuing to escalate, several world leaders have called the 2020s the "decisive decade" for climate action. The years 2023 and 2024 both broke yearly global temperature records, with 2024 breaching 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels.

Politically, the 2020s marked a period of democratic backsliding in countries such as the United States, India, and Israel, while previously authoritarian nations such as Russia or China witnessed a further slide into totalitarianism. The decade is also marked by the rise of right-wing populist and anti-democratic movements across the world, such as Giorgia Meloni's Brothers of Italy, which formed the first far-right government in Italy since the fall of Benito Mussolini's fascist dictatorship; Javier Milei's La Libertad Avanza in Argentina, which elected the first libertarian head of state in the world; Alternative for Germany, which became the leading opposition party in Germany after the 2025 German federal election; and the Republican Party in the United States shifting towards national conservatism. The 2020s also saw a decline of establishment politics as centrist parties, such as the Democratic Party's defeat in the 2024 United States elections, or Emmanuel Macron's Renaissance losing to the left-wing New Popular Front and the far-right National Rally in the 2024 French legislative election.

Anti-government demonstrations and revolts occurred, such as the chaotic Gen Z protests including the "Asian Spring" in Asian countries, predominantly led by the eponymous Generation Z, in response to inequality, declining standards of living, corruption, democratic backsliding and authoritarianism. Social media has been a common tool for activism and coordination. Protests against responses to COVID-19, against racism and police brutality by the Black Lives Matter movement, and against various forms of governmental jurisdiction, corruption, and authoritarianism occurred; along with citizen riots throughout the United States and Brazil attempting to overturn election results, seen by supporters as stolen, taking place. Among democracies in 2024, its elections saw 80% of incumbent parties lose support worldwide, as with the 2024 United States presidential election. In 2025, Trump triggered a global trade war, marking a new era of economic nationalism.

Ongoing military conflicts include those in Myanmar, Ethiopia, Mali, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Ukraine, and Gaza. The year 2021 saw the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan and the fall of Kabul to the Taliban, ending nearly 20 years of war. The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine resulted in a refugee crisis, global trade disruptions, and economic inflation. In 2023, Hamas carried out the October 7 attacks in Israel, killing over 1,200 Israelis and taking 250 as hostages. This led to the Israeli invasion, bombing, blockade, and starvation of the Gaza Strip, which has killed over 70,000 Palestinians and has been characterized as a genocide by a wide consensus of scholarship. The Gaza conflict spilled over, with Houthi attacks on commercial vessels triggering the Red Sea crisis and Israel invading Lebanon amid its conflict with Hezbollah. In 2024, a quick and renewed rebel offensive during the Syrian civil war led to the toppling of Bashar al-Assad and the fall of his regime. In 2025, Israel launched airstrikes against Iran's military and nuclear facilities, prompting Iran to retaliate and the U.S. to join with its own strikes on Iranian nuclear sites. In 2026, Israel and the United States launched major strikes on Iran, killing supreme leader Ali Khamenei.

Technology has continued to evolve in the 2020s. There have been breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, with American companies, universities, and research labs pioneering advances in the field. Generative AI-based applications, such as ChatGPT and DALL-E, allow users to instantly generate sophisticated texts, images, art, and video. Other advances made during this decade include the widespread use of teleconferencing, online learning, e-commerce and food delivery services to compensate for lockdowns ordered by governments around the world during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Streaming services, such as Disney+ and HBO Max, have increased in popularity during the decade, with cable television continuing to fall out of usage. 5G networks launched around the globe at the start of the decade and became prevalent in smartphones. Research into outer space further evolved, with the United States mainly leading space exploration, including with the James Webb Space Telescope, Ingenuity helicopter, and Artemis program. Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) are being used for remote collaboration, meetings, and training. Contactless payments, including mobile wallets such as Apple Pay and Google Pay, have grown in popularity. The growth of cryptocurrencies and AI led to the cryptocurrency bubble and AI bubble, with both involved in a circular flow of investments believed to be artificially significantly inflating their actual values.