Switzerland’s glaciers have experienced “enormous” melting this year, with a three per cent drop in total volume marking the fourth-largest annual decline on record.
This significant loss, attributed to global warming, was reported by top Swiss glaciologists on Wednesday.
The shrinkage means that Switzerland’s ice mass – home to Europe’s most glaciers – has declined by one-quarter over the last decade, according to a new report from the Swiss glacier monitoring group GLAMOS and the Swiss Academy of Sciences.
“Glacial melting in Switzerland was once again enormous in 2025,” the scientists stated. “A winter with low snow depth combined with heat waves in June and August led to a loss of 3 per cent of the glacier volume.”
Switzerland, home to nearly 1,400 glaciers – the most in Europe – faces implications from this gradual melting for hydropower, tourism, farming, and water resources across many European countries.
More than 1,000 small glaciers in Switzerland have already disappeared, the experts added.
The teams reported that a winter with little snow was followed by heat waves in June – the second-warmest on record – which left snow reserves depleted by early July. Ice masses began to melt earlier than ever, they added.
“Glaciers are clearly retreating because of anthropogenic global warming,” said Matthias Huss, the head of GLAMOS, referring to climate change caused by human activity.
“This is the main cause for the acceleration we are seeing in the last two years,” added Huss, who is also a glaciologist at Zurich’s ETHZ university.
The shrinkage is the fourth-largest after those in 2022, 2023 and back in 2003.
The retreat and loss of glaciers is also having an impact on Switzerland’s landscape, causing mountains to shift and ground to become unstable.
Swiss authorities have been on heightened alert for such changes after a huge mass of rock and ice from a glacier thundered down a mountainside that covered nearly all of the southern village of Blatten in May.
