Nuclear weapons stockpiles by country
Nine states hold an estimated 12,187 nuclear warheads. Two of them. Russia and the United States, hold 86% of that total, and since 5 February 2026 there has been no treaty limiting either of them for the first time in more than half a century.
No state publishes its exact inventory; the numbers are closely held in every case. The figures here come from the Federation of American Scientists and SIPRI, who compile them from declassified records, treaty declarations, budget documents and satellite imagery, and who say plainly that they carry significant uncertainty. Israel's are the least certain, since it has never confirmed that it has weapons at all.
Inventories, January 2026
| Country | Deployed | Reserve | Stockpile | Total | Relative size |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Russia | 1796 | 2,604 | 4,400 | 5,420 | |
| United States | 1770 | 1,930 | 3,700 | 5,042 | |
| China | 34 | 586 | 620 | 620 | |
| France | 280 | 10 | 290 | 370 | |
| United Kingdom | 120 | 105 | 225 | 225 | |
| India | - | 178 | 190 | 190 | |
| Pakistan | - | 170 | 170 | 170 | |
| Israelundeclared | - | 90 | 90 | 90 | |
| North Korea | - | 60 | 60 | 60 |
"Stockpile" is what is considered potentially usable. "Total" adds retired warheads queued for dismantlement. Headline figures differ between sources because they are often not counting the same thing.
New START, the last treaty capping US and Russian deployed strategic warheads, expired on 5 February 2026 with no successor and no negotiations under way. Russia has said it will observe the treaty's central limits informally for as long as the United States does; the United States has said it wants a broader agreement that also covers China and Russia's non-strategic weapons.
Until something replaces it, there is no legally binding limit on the strategic arsenals of the two states that hold 86% of the world's warheads, and no inspection regime verifying either.
Why this sits on a fuel chain site
A weapon needs fissile material: either uranium enriched to around 90%, or plutonium separated from irradiated fuel. Both come out of the same two industrial stages this site tracks for civil purposes.
- Enrichment. The centrifuges that take uranium from 0.7% to 5% for a power reactor will take it to 90% if you keep going. Nothing about the machine changes. Enrichment technology is export-controlled under the Nuclear Suppliers Group, and why a new entrant faces non-proliferation politics as much as capital cost.
- Reprocessing. Separating plutonium from used fuel to recycle it also produces the other weapons material. This is why the United States abandoned commercial reprocessing in the 1970s, and why Japan's plutonium balance is watched as closely as its reactors.
- Naval propulsion. The largest use of highly enriched uranium outside weapons programmes. US and UK submarines run on ~93% material, weapons-grade , while France runs its on 5–7%.
Between 1993 and 2013, the Megatons to Megawatts programme downblended 500 tonnes of Russian weapons-grade uranium, material from an estimated 20,000 warheads, into low-enriched fuel for American power reactors. For two decades a substantial share of US nuclear electricity came from dismantled Soviet weapons. The same chemistry runs today at Savannah River, where surplus US high-enriched uranium is being diluted into HALEU to fuel the advanced reactors that have no other supply.