Overview

• Asia’s average temperature in 2024 was about 1.04 °C above the 1991–2020 mean, making it the warmest or second warmest year on record for the continent.
• The warming trend from 1991 to 2024 was nearly double that of the 1961–1990 period, driven by faster land temperature increases than the global average.
• Sea surface temperatures in Asia have risen at 0.24 °C per decade—almost twice the global rate—fueling extensive marine heatwaves that covered nearly 15 million km² of ocean in 2024.
• Twenty-three of 24 monitored glaciers in the central Himalayas and Tian Shan experienced mass loss, elevating the risk of glacial lake outburst floods and long-term water shortages.
• Extreme events in 2024—including heatwaves that claimed over 450 lives in India, Kerala landslides after record rains and Nepal floods that killed at least 246 people—highlighted the growing human and economic toll.