More displaced by wars than by natural disasters for the first time in 30 years

BarcelonaIn the last decade, the number of people forced to flee their homes and move elsewhere within their own country has doubled. Natural disasters, exacerbated by the climate crisis, used to be the main cause, but last year, for the first time, wars and violence became the factor forcing more people to move, according to the latest annual report from the Internal Displacement Observatory (IDMC), linked to the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).

The observatory calculates the movements of these groups year after year. In many cases, the same person is forced to move several times, as have recounted, for example, the inhabitants of the Gaza Strip, affected by constant evacuation orders from the Israeli army, or those from certain areas of Sudan, besieged by the clashes between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

During 2025, 62.2 million displacements were recorded, of which more than 32 million had wars or violence as the main cause. For the first time since this report was produced, almost thirty years ago, the number of internally displaced people due to conflicts in one year exceeded those caused by disasters. Furthermore, they represent a 60% increase compared to the previous year, when 20 million displacements were due to conflicts. "It is a sign of global collapse in preventing conflicts and protecting civilians," laments Jan Egeland, Secretary General of the NRC.

Iran was the country where the most displacements due to conflict were registered last year, with 10 million, although most were people who were temporarily evacuated from the capital but ended up returning. The second country that suffered the most displacements was the Democratic Republic of the Congo (9.7 million), followed by Palestine (2.7 million), Sudan (1.7 million), and Haiti (977,000).

The main cause was international armed conflicts –between different states–, which accounted for 46% of these types of displacements, followed by non-international armed conflicts, that is, between different factions within the same state, as is the case in Sudan.

Regarding displacement due to natural disasters, Filipinos were the hardest hit last year, with 10.7 million displaced, followed by Chinese (3.5 million) and Pakistanis (3 million). 90% were related to weather-related disasters, mainly storms and floods, and a much smaller portion was due to geophysical disasters, such as tsunamis and earthquakes.

The NGO warns that forest fires are increasingly a cause of internal displacement worldwide, with nearly 700,000 movements for this reason last year, the second highest figure in the last decade.

82 million displaced in total

The previous data is a summary of the number of movements made throughout last year, which may include various displacements of the same person. But the final count at the close of 2025 left a figure of 82.2 million displaced people in total. That is, this is the number of people who at the end of last year were effectively registered as displaced, many of whom have lived in this state of provisionality for years or even decades.

Of these, 68.6 million have had to flee due to conflicts and violence. The most affected countries are Sudan, Colombia, Syria, Yemen, and Afghanistan. Among the 13.6 million who have had to displace themselves due to natural disasters, the most affected are the inhabitants of Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Turkey, and South Sudan.

After a decade of continuous growth, the number of people living in internal displacement decreased slightly in 2025, but remained close to the record level reached the previous year, when a historic high of 83.4 million displaced people worldwide was recorded. According to the NGO, the decrease was partially related to returns, "many of which took place in fragile conditions," to places with destroyed infrastructure, and "should not be confused with progress."