Green Sea Turtle Downlisted from "Endangered" to "Least Concern" by IUCN — A Once-in-a-Generation Conservation Win

The green sea turtle — Chelonia mydas — has been removed from the Endangered list in one of the most dramatic recoveries the IUCN Red List has ever recorded. Announced at the 2025 IUCN World Conservation Congress in Abu Dhabi and reflected in updated assessments now reaching the public in April 2026, the species was downlisted directly to Least Concern, skipping the intermediate categories of Vulnerable and Near Threatened.

According to the assessment, the global population has grown by roughly 28% since the 1970s. Decades of work made the difference: protected nesting beaches in Australia, Costa Rica, Hawaii and the Mediterranean, prohibitions on the egg and meat trade, redesigned fishing gear that reduces bycatch, and community-led patrols that escort hatchlings to the sea every nesting season.

“Announced at the 2025 IUCN World Conservation Congress in Abu Dhabi and reflected in updated assessments now reaching the public in April 2026, the species was downlisted directly to Least Concern, skipping the intermediate categories of Vulnerable and Near Threatened.”

Conservationists are quick to caution that the global picture is uneven. Several regional populations — including those in Central America, parts of the Mediterranean and certain Pacific island nations — are still threatened. Climate change is also tilting hatchling sex ratios as warmer sand produces more females, and rising seas are eroding nesting beaches. Plastic and bycatch remain serious risks.

Even with those caveats, the news is a powerful reminder that long-term conservation works. As Roderic Mast of the IUCN Marine Turtle Specialist Group put it, "We protected them, and they came back." For a species that swims thousands of miles between feeding and nesting grounds, the next chapter will require continued international cooperation — but the foundation is now in place.