Amazon Deforestation Falls to Lowest Level Since Records Began in 1988

Brazil’s Amazon lost less forest to clearing in the year ending July 2026 than in any year since record-keeping began in 1988. Official figures from the national space research agency, INPE, show about 3,335 square kilometers were cleared between August 2025 and July 2026, according to InfoAmazonia and Reuters.¹²

That is roughly 42% below the previous year’s 5,731 square kilometers. Brazilian outlets calculated the drop at 41.8%.⁴ The old record low, 4,571 square kilometers, dated from 2012.¹

The rainforest matters well beyond Brazil. Less clearing is good news for the climate, for wildlife and for the Indigenous and forest communities who depend on it.

How Brazil measures a disappearing forest

The numbers come from PRODES, the INPE satellite program that produces Brazil’s official annual deforestation rate. Its year runs August to July, a calendar set by the weather: there is less cloud cover in the middle of the year, which matters a great deal when your measuring tape is in orbit.²³

PRODES counts clear-cutting, where forest is removed entirely. It does not capture forest that is thinned out by logging or damaged by drought and fire. Mongabay has noted that the Amazon remains vulnerable to all of those, and that such losses may not show up in clear-cut statistics.⁵

The result did not arrive out of nowhere. INPE’s alert system, DETER, had flagged 2,874 square kilometers of clearing over the same 12 months, down 36% and the lowest since that system began in 2015. That hinted a record annual figure was coming.⁵

Gains beyond the rainforest

The Cerrado savanna also hit a record low. Clearing there fell about 24% to roughly 5,517 square kilometers, the smallest figure since that series began in 2001.²⁴

Pará, the Amazon state with the most clearing, kept that title but cut its cleared area by about 45%.⁴

Márcio Astrini, executive secretary of Observatório do Clima, greeted the figures with this line, reported by InfoAmazonia:¹

“Os números divulgados hoje são uma conquista histórica.”

In English, he called the numbers released that day a historic achievement.

The policy and the timing

Deforestation has fallen since President Lula revived PPCDAm, a federal action plan against deforestation. The plan was created during his first term and interrupted under former President Jair Bolsonaro. Its 2023 version brings together 13 federal ministries.¹ Mongabay reported that the decline in alerts has coincided with stronger enforcement.⁵

Measured against 2022, Bolsonaro’s last year in office, when 11,594 square kilometers were cleared, the area has fallen about 71%.¹³

These are official government figures. The Lula government presented them at an event at the Planalto Palace in Brasília, with the Environment Ministry and INPE walking through the data.³⁴ The announcement came shortly before Brazil’s presidential run-off on October 25 between Lula and Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, who finished ahead of Lula in the first round on October 4.⁷⁸

The Guardian described the Amazon gains as finely balanced ahead of the vote.⁶ Climate scientists cited by Grist warn that a Bolsonaro win could push deforestation back up.⁸