Despite talk of a 'net zero recession', most governments and companies are persisting with, and expanding, their commitments to a clean future, and whilst several oil, gas and financial firms have weakened or abandoned targets, the broader trend is one of resilience.

The fifth annual Net Zero Stocktake 2025 has been released, assessing progress in net-zero targets and evaluates more than 4,000 entities on integrity criteria: essentially, whether plans and strategies contain the key components for deep decarbonisation.

The report finds that target-setting is still rising. As of September 2025, at least 1,935 entities have net-zero (or similar) targets, an increase from 769 in December 2020. Globally, target-setting is expanding across companies, regions and cities.

Almost two-thirds (63 per cent) of the Forbes Global 2000 have net-zero targets, covering $36.6tr in revenue. In the US, company commitments grew by 9 per cent in the past year despite the political climate.

Currently 137 of 198 national governments (including the EU and Taiwan) have net-zero targets. Nineteen of the G20 have adopted net-zero targets, though overall country-level coverage has dipped compared with 2024 due to the US government abandoning its commitment. Encouragingly, 67 per cent of remaining national targets are now enshrined in law or policy, up from 52 per cent last year.

Net-zero is not inevitable, the report concludes, but its persistence through the turbulence of 2025 is itself a “powerful signal”, and the challenge is to ensure that the next generation of targets, plans and policies is resilient enough to survive political turbulence and deliver deep decarbonisation.

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