Russia's losses in the war with Ukraine have grown faster in the last 10 months than in any other period since the start of the invasion in 2022, according to a BBC analysis.

Obituaries of soldiers published in Russian sources rose 40% year-on-year in 2025, as peace efforts intensified under pressure from the administration of US President Donald Trump.

In total, the BBC has confirmed the names of nearly 160,000 people killed fighting on the Russian side in Ukraine.

The BBC Russian Service tallied Moscow's war losses together with the independent media outlet Mediazona and a group of volunteers from February 2022.

It compiled a list of identified individuals whose deaths could be confirmed using official reports, newspapers, social media, war memorials, and serious.

The Figures

The actual number of deaths is believed to be much higher, and the military experts we consulted believe our analysis of cemeteries, memorials, and obituaries could represent between 45% and 65% of the total.

This would put the number of Russian deaths between 243,000 and 352,000.

The number of obituaries in a given period is a preliminary estimate of confirmed casualties, as some require further verification and will eventually be discarded.

If anything, it can indicate how the intensity of fighting varies over time.

The year 2025 began with a relatively low number of obituaries published in January, compared to previous months. The figure increased in February, when Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin spoke directly for the first time about ending the war in Ukraine.

The next peak in August coincided with the meeting of the two presidents in Alaska, a diplomatic success for Putin that was widely seen as the end of his international isolation.

In October, When a planned second summit between Russia and the United States was finally cancelled, and then in November, when the United States presented a 28-point peace proposal, an average of 322 obituaries were published per day, double the 2024 average.It is difficult to attribute the increase in Russian losses to a single factor, but the Kremlin views territorial gains as a way to influence negotiations with the United States in its favor: Putin's advisor, Yuri Ushakov, recently emphasized that "recent successes" had had a positive impact. The Mukashev Case: Murat Mukashev was one of those who bet on a quick peace settlement, and it cost him his life. He was an activist who had never supported Vladimir Putin's policies. Over the years, he had participated in demonstrations against police violence and torture, and joined rallies in support of LGBT rights and the release of Alexei Navalny, the Kremlin's main opponent who died in prison in 2024. He had repeatedly condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine on social media since 2022. In early 2024, Mukashev was arrested near his home in Moscow and charged with large-scale drug trafficking. While his case was being heard, he was offered a contract with the Ministry of Defense, according to his friends and family. They considered the serious charges against him a common tactic to force people into enlisting. A 2024 law allows defendants to avoid a criminal conviction if they go to war, an attractive option in a country with an acquittal rate of less than 1%. Mukashev rejected the offer, and the court sentenced him to 10 years in a high-security penal colony. In prison, in November 2024, he changed his mind. His friends said Trump's promises to end the war quickly encouraged him, and he decided he needed to enlist as soon as possible to secure his release before a peace agreement was reached. “He saw this as an opportunity to be freed rather than be imprisoned for 10 years under a strict regime,” a statement from his support group said. It was not explained how he reconciled his participation in the war with his stated reluctance to kill. On June 11, 2025, Mukashev died fighting as part of an assault squad in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine. Like him, most of the Russians killed on the front lines in 2025 had no connection to the military at the start of the large-scale war, BBC figures show. But since the bloody battle for the city of Avdiivka in October 2023, There has been a steady increase in casualties among so-called “volunteers.”

Those who have enlisted voluntarily since the beginning of the invasion appear to constitute the majority of new Russian recruits, as opposed to professional soldiers who had joined the army before the invasion or those mobilized for military service afterward.

A year ago, 15% of Russian military deaths were volunteers, but by 2025 the proportion is projected to be one in three.

How Russia Replaces the Dead

Local governments, under pressure to maintain a steady flow of new recruits, are offering substantial salaries, targeting people with large debts,and conducting recruitment campaigns at universities and vocational training centers.

This has allowed the Kremlin to offset heavy losses on the front lines while avoiding the politically risky measure of large-scale conscription.

According to Deputy Chief of the National Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev said that between January and October, 336,000 people had enlisted in the army, more than 30,000 per month. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has stated that 25,000 Russian soldiers die every month. If both figures are correct, Russia continues to recruit more soldiers than it loses. According to obituaries and family testimonies, the majority of those who enlisted did so voluntarily. There are, however, reports of pressure and coercion, especially against regular recruits and those accused of criminal offenses.

Some recruits mistakenly believe that, after a year of service, they will be able to return to their former lives with money in their pockets.

A new recruit can earn up to 10 million rubles (about US$128,000) in a year.

In reality, all contracts signed with the Ministry of Defense since September 2022 are automatically renewed until the end of the war.

According to NATO, the total number of Russian dead and wounded in the war amounts to 1.1 million, and one official has estimated that there have been 250,000 fatalities.

This matches the BBC's calculations, although our list does not include those killed while serving in the militias of two occupied regions in eastern Ukraine, which we estimate at between 21,000 and 23,500 combatants.

Ukraine has also suffered heavy losses.

Last February, President Volodymyr Zelensky put the number of dead on the battlefield at 46,000 and the number of wounded at 380,000.

Tens of thousands more were missing or taken captive, he added.

Based on other estimates and a comparison of data,We believe the number of Ukrainians who have died to date is 140,000.

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