Country Overshoot Days 2025

Country Overshoot Day Calendar & Calculations 2025

A country’s overshoot day marks the date when Earth Overshoot Day would fall if all of humanity consumed at the same level as the people in that country.

This is different from a country’s deficit day, which refers to the date by which the residents of the country begin to demand more than their country’s ecosystems can provide in the entire year.

Country Overshoot Days are published annually in December of the year prior, using the latest data from the most recent edition of the National Footprint and Biocapacity Accounts.

Based on the 2025 edition of the National Footprint and Biocapacity Accounts

The country overshoot days for 2025 are based on the preliminary 2025 edition. For most countries, the dates reflect the 2023 situation—the latest data point currently available. The full 2025 edition will be released on Earth Day 2025 (April 22) and is being prepared by York University’s Ecological Footprint Initiative for FoDaFo, the governing body of the National Footprint and Biocapacity Accounts.

The 2025 edition will include results from 1961 to 2024. Due to time lags in data reporting, results from 2022 to 2024 will be based on a mix of actual data and preliminary estimates. These preliminary estimates, similar to GDP forecasts, are less robust than those for earlier years, which are based on fully reported data sets.

Detailed information on the 2025 edition, including methodological improvements, will be available upon release in April 2025. For reference, you can access the release notes of the 2023 edition as well as the interim 2024 edition. Explanations about how shifts in the accounts has affected Country Overshoot Day estimates are explained here, using the example of the Netherlands.

To understand time trends, consult the latest official edition on the Footprint Data Platform. Its interactive map allows you to view country-specific trends from 1961 to the present.

At the bottom of this page, after the table with all the countries’ dates, there is a brief explanation what the implication is for using the newest edition.

Example: Calculating Switzerland’s Overshoot Day

Switzerland’s 2025 Overshoot Day is based on data from the preliminary 2025 edition of the National Footprint and Biocapacity Accounts. Since the most recent data point is for 2023, Switzerland’s 2025 Overshoot Day reflects the situation in 2023:

• Switzerland’s Ecological Footprint: 4.25 global hectares (gha) per person in 2023
• Global biocapacity: 1.48 gha per person in 2023

Thus, in 2023, humanity would need (4.25/ 1.48)  = 2.87 Earths to support itself if everyone lived like the Swiss.

Since 2025 contains 365 days, we can determine Swiss Overshoot Day:

365 [days in 2025] * (1.48/4.25) = 127 [days].

This means humanity would have exhausted the annual regenerative resource budget by the 127th day of 2025, which is May 7th. Also note: using up the entire budget would leave nothing for wild species.

Results

Here, in Table 1, is the list of the Country Overshoot Days for 2025, for Switzerland and 85 other countries. It also lists the EU Overshoot Day for the European Union containing 28 countries. It will be on April 29 this year.

These dates were released in December 2024, and are based on the latest reported national data. For most countries, they capture the 2023 situation.

Table 1: Country Overshoot Days for 2025

Countries Without an Overshoot Day

If a country’s Ecological Footprint per person is smaller than global biocapacity per person (1.48 gha), humanity would not exceed the planet’s regenerative capacity within a year if everyone consumed like that country. These countries are therefore omitted from this graph and from table 1 above.

Some countries are also excluded due to incomplete or unreliable data, as data quality varies across UN datasets.

In leap years, like 2024, calculations are adjusted for a 366-day year instead of 365.

You can download the 2023 edition public dataset with country results. This will be updated with the 2025 edition upon its release.

How Have Country Overshoot Days Changed Over Time?

To analyze trends in Country Overshoot Days, consult the Footprint Data Platform, which provides consistent time series data, all based on the same National Footprint and Biocapacity Accounts edition.

Comparing country overshoot days across different editions is misleading. Because some change results from improvements in underlying data rather than actual shifts in consumption. This is explained using the example of the Netherlands here. These are key changes in data input from the 2023 edition to the 2025 edition:

1. Agricultural area data: Updates to grazing land and cropland statistics from the UN FAO ResourceStat.
2. Global Carbon Budget data: Revised estimates for oceanic carbon uptake.
3. Trade classifications: Adjustments in carbon embodied in trade due to restructuring in UN Comtrade datasets.

For this edition change, the change due to different input data is larger for most countries than the actual change due to shifts in consumption. For clarity, the table below shows how much change in overshoot dates for 2022 is driven by:

• Updates in input data and methodology (3rd column in table 2 below), versus
• Real shifts in consumption patterns (4th column in table 2 below).

The data-input-driven change can be assessed by comparing the 2022 results from the 2023 edition with those of the preliminary 2025 edition. The consumption change can be determined by comparing results for 2022 and 2023 within the preliminary 2025 edition. For deeper insights, visit the Footprint Data Platform, which will be updated with the 2025 edition once that edition is completed and officially launched.

Table 2: Dates of Country Overshoot Days in 2025 and changes due to updated data inputs and due to country’s actual change of consumption levels

Additional Resources

Country Deficit Day
Country data on Footprint Data Platform
How edition changes shift historical Country Overshoot Days
Earth Overshoot Day
About the Ecological Footprint
About Country Overshoot Days
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