Greenland ice sheet shrinks for 30th year in a row

Greenland has now marked the 30th consecutive year where it lost more ice than it gained. 

Over the 12-month period to August 2026, the world’s second-largest ice sheet lost around 135bn tonnes of ice. 

This major ice loss came as the region experienced a relatively cool start to summer and less surface melt than in previous years. 

In other words, it was not an “extreme” year for weather in Greenland – and, yet, the ice sheet ended firmly in the red.

Three decades of continuous ice loss in Greenland is significant, given that scientists typically need 30 years of data to separate the “fingerprint” of human-caused climate change from natural variations in the climate. 

In Greenland, the direction of travel has been the same – downward – every single year for 30 years.

These latest figures come as a new report highlights that ice melting processes seen for decades in Greenland are increasingly being replicated in Antarctica.

Greenland, therefore, is not only the largest present-day source of ice-driven sea level rise – but offers a preview of what is in store for the world’s largest ice sheet. 

(For our previous analyses of Greenland’s ice cover, see coverage in 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016 and 2015.)