Global Risks Report 2026

3.0 3.5 2.5 3.5 4.0 4.5 5.0 5.5 4.0 4.5 5.0 5.5 1 7 1 7 6.0 Long-term severity (10 years) Visible area Adverse outcomes of AI technologies Adverse outcomes of frontier technologies Asset bubble bursts Biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse Biological, chemical or nuclear weapons or hazards Censorship and surveillance Concentration of strategic resources and technologies Crime and illicit economic activity Critical change to Earth systems Cyber insecurity Debt Decline in health and well-being Disruptions to a systemically important supply chain Disruptions to critical infrastructure Economic downturn Erosion of human rights and/or of civic freedoms Extreme weather events Geoeconomic confrontation Inequality Infectious diseases Inflation Insufficient public infrastructure and social protections Intrastate violence Involuntary migration or displacement Lack of economic opportunity or unemployment Misinformation and disinformation Natural resource shortages Non-weather related natural disasters Online harms Pollution Societal polarization State-based armed conflict Talent and/or labour shortagesRelative severity of global risks, short term (2 years) and long term (10 years) FIGURE 17 Source World Economic Forum Global Risks Perception Survey 2025-2026Note Severity was assessed on a 1-7 Likert scale [1 = Low severity, 7 = High severity]. Short-term severity (2 years) Deteriorating risksRisk categories Economic Environmental Geopolitical Societal Technological under 30 are concerned by Biological, chemical or nuclear weapons or hazards (#10), while the 60-69-year age group is worried about State- based armed conflict (#10) (Figure 18). Across stakeholder groups, there is diminishing concern for geopolitical risks looking ahead 10 years, although respondents from academia include State-based armed conflict in their top 10 (at #10). Concentration of strategic resources and technologies was also selected as a concern by both the 50-59-year age group (Figure 18, at #10) and by governments (also at #10) over the next decade (Figure 19). Global Risks Report 2026 20