Russian forces fighting against Ukraine in 2024 suffered the highest casualty numbers of any year since the start of Vladimir Putin's full-scale invasion, according to Kyiv.
Ukraine's New Year's Day tally of Russian losses, which includes those killed and wounded, showed that over the last 12 months Russia lost 430,790 troops.
This is a big jump from the estimated quarter of million casualties Kyiv said Russia faced in 2023. Newsweek has contacted the Russian defense ministry for comment.
Why it matters
The war Vladimir Putin started will enter its fourth year on February 24 and while his forces are making incremental gains in Ukraine's east, it is coming at an increasingly high cost in personnel.
This has an economic impact due to the compensation for families of casualties, high wages required to entice new troops and the worker shortage it exacerbates It could be a factor to bring Russia to the table for negotiations as Donald Trump enters the White House with a pledge to end the war quickly.
What to know
Getting an accurate figure of casualties in the war is difficult as Kyiv's estimates are often higher than those from other sources and both sides are tight-lipped about their losses.
Ukraine's defense ministry said on Wednesday that Russia had lost 790,800 troops over the whole war. Its tally at the same time last year was 360,010 which means that over the last 12 months, the number of dead or wounded Russian personnel totaled 430,790.
For comparison, Kyiv's tally of Russian losses for 2023 was 253,290, while the period between the start of the war on February 24, 2022 and January 1, 2023, there were 106,720 losses.
By contrast, in December, Ukrainian president Volodymr Zelensky said that 43,000 Ukrainian soldiers had been killed in the war and that 370,000 injuries had been reported although this included troops injured more than once. Newsweek is unable to verify either side's casualty figures. The Ukrainian president also claimed that 198,000 Russian soldiers had been killed and 550,000 wounded.
The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) compared Russian troop losses with its territorial gains estimating that last year, Moscow suffered around 102 casualties for every square kilometer of Ukrainian territory seized.
This was based on a lower number of Russian casualties of 420,000 which was divided the 4,168 square kilometers (1,609 square miles) of territory that geolocated evidence showed Moscow had gained, largely consisting of fields and small settlements in Ukraine and Kursk Oblast.
The Washington, D.C. think tank had previously reported that intensified Russian offensive operations between September and November had seen Moscow gain 2,356 square kilometers, (909 square miles) or 56.5 percent of the total territorial gains for the year, in exchange for an estimated 125,800 casualties.
The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian casualties averaged 1,585 a day in December while Commander-in-Chief Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi said on December 30 that Russia had lost 1,700 troops in the previous week alone, mostly in the Donetsk region.
What people are saying
Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi: "The enemy continues to carry out continuous meat assaults, suffering record losses."
Institute for the Study of War on December 31: "Russian forces gained 4,168 square kilometers, largely comprised fields and small settlements in Ukraine and Kursk Oblast, at a reported cost of over 420,000 casualties in 2024.
What happens next
Going into 2025, Russia has the battlefield momentum and is likely to continue suffering high personnel losses as they continue operations to capture Chasiv Yar in Donetsk amid reported plans for a push further south in Zaporizhzhia.
However, Russia appears to be recruiting enough troops to replenish these losses, Russian Security Council Deputy Chairperson Dmitry Medvedev saying on December 24 that 440,000 recruits had signed military service contracts in 2024.
The ISW said that this suggests Russia is recruiting just enough military personnel to replace its recently high casualty rates one for one."
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