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Decade Files · No. 01 · 2020 to today · Updated as it happens

The 2020s.

A pandemic, a new space telescope, chatbots that talk back, and a dozen eggs at $6.23. The decade so far as a case file: every fact sourced, and what it means for the records your family is leaving behind.

331.4 millionpeople counted in the 2020 U.S. census[1]
8 billionpeople on Earth, reached in November 2022 (UN)[2]
7.1 millionCOVID-19 deaths reported to the WHO so far[3]
$6.23a dozen eggs at the March 2025 peak (BLS)[4]
2092the year the 2020 census records open to families[5]

Researched by James Duncan. Every fact links to its source. The decade isn’t over: this file is updated as it happens.

Year by year

The decade in 60 seconds

The moments most people will remember, one year at a time.

2020

  1. January 31, 2020United Kingdom leaves the European Union The UK formally left the EU at 11 p.m. UK time, starting a transition period that ran until 31 December 2020.[6]
  2. March 11, 2020WHO calls COVID-19 a pandemic The World Health Organization's Director-General said COVID-19 "can be characterized as a pandemic." At that point there were more than 118,000 cases in 114 countries and 4,291 deaths.[7]
  3. May 25, 2020George Floyd dies in Minneapolis police custody George Floyd died during an arrest by Minneapolis police, and protests followed across the country. Former officer Derek Chauvin was convicted of second-degree murder and manslaughter on 20 April 2021.[8]
  4. May 30, 2020First commercial spacecraft launches NASA astronauts NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley launched from Florida on SpaceX's Crew Dragon. It was the first crewed launch from U.S. soil since 2011, and the first in a commercially built and operated American crew spacecraft.[9]
  5. November 3, 2020Biden wins the U.S. presidential election Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump, winning 306 electoral votes to 232.[10]

2021

  1. January 6, 2021Mob breaks into the U.S. Capitol Rioters forced their way into the Capitol while Congress was certifying the 2020 presidential election results. The certification was completed at 3:44 a.m. on 7 January.[11]
  2. February 18, 2021Perseverance rover lands on Mars NASA's Perseverance rover touched down in Jezero Crater after a 203-day journey of 293 million miles.[12]
  3. March 23, 2021Ever Given blocks the Suez Canal The container ship Ever Given ran aground and blocked the canal until it was refloated on 29 March. More than 430 ships were left waiting at the two entrances.[13]
  4. August 8, 2021Delayed Tokyo Olympics close in empty stadiums The Tokyo Olympics, postponed a year by the pandemic, closed after 16 days of competition. Spectators were largely kept out of the stands.[14]
  5. August 30, 2021Last U.S. troops leave Afghanistan The last U.S. military aircraft left Kabul, ending the U.S. military presence after nearly 20 years. U.S. and coalition aircraft had evacuated more than 123,000 civilians.[15]

2022

  1. February 24, 2022Russia launches full-scale invasion of Ukraine President Vladimir Putin announced a "special military operation" in Ukraine while the UN Security Council was meeting in emergency session.[16]
  2. June 24, 2022Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade In Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion. The decision returned the regulation of abortion to elected lawmakers.[17]
  3. September 8, 2022Queen Elizabeth II dies Britain's longest-reigning monarch died after 70 years on the throne. Her son became King Charles III.[18]
  4. November 15, 2022World population reaches 8 billion The United Nations marked 15 November 2022 as the day the world's population reached 8 billion. The date is a UN projection, not a counted moment.[19]
  5. December 18, 2022Argentina wins the World Cup in Qatar Argentina beat France 4-2 on penalties in the final at Lusail Stadium. It was Argentina's third title and Lionel Messi's first.[20]

2023

  1. February 6, 2023Major earthquakes strike Türkiye near Syria A magnitude 7.8 earthquake hit south-central Türkiye near the Syrian border, and a magnitude 7.5 quake followed about nine hours later. There was very large loss of life.[21]
  2. May 5, 2023WHO ends COVID-19 global health emergency The WHO Director-General declared COVID-19 "over as a global health emergency," just over three years after the emergency was declared.[22]
  3. May 6, 2023King Charles III crowned at Westminster Abbey Charles III was crowned alongside Queen Camilla. He was the 40th reigning monarch crowned at the Abbey and the oldest British monarch ever crowned.[23]
  4. August 8, 2023Wildfires destroy Lahaina, Maui Wind-driven wildfires on Maui killed more than 100 people and destroyed more than 2,200 structures, most of them in historic Lahaina. It was Hawaii's worst natural disaster.[24]
  5. October 7, 2023Hamas attack on Israel; war in Gaza Hamas and other armed groups attacked Israel, killing more than 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages into Gaza. In the war that followed, UN agencies report more than 70,000 people killed in Gaza; a ceasefire took effect in October 2025.[25]

2024

  1. April 8, 2024Total solar eclipse crosses North America A total solar eclipse crossed Mexico, then the United States from Texas to Maine, then Canada.[26]
  2. July 13, 2024Assassination attempt on Donald Trump A gunman shot at Donald Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, wounding him. Spectator Corey Comperatore was killed and two other men were injured.[27]
  3. August 11, 2024Paris Olympics close at Stade de France The Paris Games, which opened with a ceremony along the Seine, ended with the United States on top of the medal table: 126 medals, 40 of them gold.[28]
  4. September 26, 2024Hurricane Helene hits Florida's Big Bend Helene came ashore as a Category 4 hurricane, and its effects reached from Florida to North Carolina. It killed at least 219 people and caused about $78.7 billion in damage.[29]
  5. November 5, 2024Trump wins the U.S. presidential election Donald Trump defeated Kamala Harris, winning 312 electoral votes to 226.[30]

2025

  1. January 7, 2025Palisades and Eaton fires hit Los Angeles Two wind-driven fires broke out in Los Angeles County on the same day. CAL FIRE records 31 civilian deaths (12 and 19) and about 16,000 structures destroyed (6,845 and 9,419).[31]
  2. January 29, 2025Midair collision over the Potomac River An American Airlines regional jet and a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter collided near Reagan Washington National Airport. All 67 people aboard the two aircraft were killed.[32]
  3. May 8, 2025Leo XIV becomes first American pope Cardinal Robert Prevost of Chicago was elected pope and took the name Leo XIV. Pope Francis had died on 21 April 2025.[33]
  4. July 4, 2025Flash flood on Texas's Guadalupe River Catastrophic flash flooding along the Guadalupe River in the Texas Hill Country killed at least 135 people.[34]
  5. November 12, 2025Longest U.S. government shutdown ends A funding bill was signed on 12 November, ending a 43-day shutdown that began on 1 October. It was the longest in U.S. history.[35]

2026

  1. January 3, 2026U.S. forces seize Venezuela's Nicolás Maduro In an overnight operation in Venezuela, U.S. forces seized President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. Maduro was flown to New York to face a narco-terrorism conspiracy indictment.[36]
  2. February 28, 2026U.S. and Israel strike Iran A joint U.S. and Israeli bombing campaign hit Iranian military and government sites, and President Trump announced that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei had been killed; Iran had not commented at the time of the first reports.[37]
  3. April 1, 2026Artemis II carries astronauts around the Moon Four astronauts (Wiseman, Glover, Koch and Canada's Hansen) launched on the first crewed lunar mission in more than half a century. They reached 252,756 miles from Earth, the farthest humans have ever traveled, and splashed down on 10 April.[38]
  4. July 4, 2026United States marks its 250th birthday The country celebrated 250 years since the Declaration of Independence. In Washington, storms forced the National Mall to be evacuated before fireworks lit the sky shortly before midnight.[39]
  5. July 19, 2026Spain wins the World Cup in North America Spain beat Argentina 1-0 after extra time at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey, with a goal by Ferran Torres, for its second World Cup title. The United States, Canada and Mexico co-hosted the tournament.[40]
New

What it brought

Things that arrived or took off in the 2020s.

Gone

What went away

Things the 2020s ended.

In memory

Who we lost

Public figures who died this decade, in date order.

Prices

What it cost

U.S. prices at the start of the decade and the latest official figure.

Pictures

The decade in pictures

Public-domain and openly licensed images, each with its credit and source.

2020 A "Mask Up!" sign at the Route 66 Casino Hotel and Travel Center on the south side of Albuquerque, New Mexico, photographed by Carol M. Highsmith in December 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic.
2020 This illustration, created at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, shows the spiked structure of a coronavirus; the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 causes the illness named coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
2021 A camera aboard the descent stage captured this view of NASA's Perseverance rover as it touched down on Mars on February 18, 2021.
2022 NASA's Space Launch System rocket carrying the Orion spacecraft launches on the Artemis I flight test from Launch Complex 39B at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on November 16, 2022.
2022 The Near-Infrared Camera on the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope captured the "Cosmic Cliffs", the edge of the young star-forming region NGC 3324 in the Carina Nebula, in an image released on July 12, 2022. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI (CC BY 4.0)
2023 The sample return capsule from NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission, carrying material collected from the asteroid Bennu in October 2020, rests in the desert at the Department of Defense's Utah Test and Training Range shortly after touching down on September 24, 2023.
2024 The total solar eclipse of April 8, 2024, seen from Dallas, Texas, as the path of totality crossed North America from Mexico's Pacific coast to the Atlantic coast of Newfoundland, Canada.
2025 Hurricane Melissa, then a Category 5 storm, photographed from the International Space Station on October 28, 2025, about 50 miles south of Jamaica.
2026 Earth sets behind the cratered lunar surface in this view captured through an Orion spacecraft window at 6:41 p.m. EDT on April 6, 2026, during the Artemis II crew's flyby of the Moon.
Your records

The paper trail of the 2020s

What changed for family history this decade.

How your family will be found in 100 years

Ask your family

Questions to ask while you can

Ask someone who lived it, and write the answers down. That’s how a family history starts.

  1. Where were you in spring 2020 when everything closed, and what did an ordinary day at home look like?
  2. Which family wedding, birthday or graduation in the 2020s happened differently than planned, and what do you remember most about it?
  3. Did you ever take a DNA test? What surprised you, and did you find any new relatives?
  4. Which photos, videos or messages from these years would you most want your great-grandchildren to see, and where are they saved?
Start your family’s file

Get the free guide to hiring a genealogist, or open a case and let us trace your family back through the decades.

Get the free guideOpen a case
Sources

Every source on this page

Numbered in the order they first appear.

  1. [1] U.S. Census Bureau: 2020 Census Apportionment Results Delivered to the President (April 26, 2021)
  2. [2] UN DESA: As the world's population hits 8 billion people (15 November 2022)
  3. [3] WHO COVID-19 dashboard, latest reported counts (CSV download from data.who.int)
  4. [4] U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Average Price Data, series APU0000708111
  5. [5] U.S. Census Bureau: The 72-Year Rule
  6. [6] Scottish Parliament Information Centre briefing, Brexit exit day (29 Jan 2020)
  7. [7] WHO Director-General's opening remarks, 11 March 2020
  8. [8] Minnesota Attorney General's Office (May 2023 release)
  9. [9] NASA news release, SpaceX Demo-2 launch
  10. [10] National Archives, 2020 Electoral College results
  11. [11] U.S. Capitol Police, Officer Brian Sicknick
  12. [12] NASA news release, Perseverance touchdown
  13. [13] Port Economics, Management and Policy: Blockage of the Suez Canal, March 2021
  14. [14] PBS NewsHour, Games like no other: Tokyo 2020 ends
  15. [15] U.S. Army: Military phase of evacuation ends
  16. [16] UN News, 24 February 2022
  17. [17] Cornell Law School LII, Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization opinion
  18. [18] GOV.UK, Prime Minister's statement, 8 September 2022
  19. [19] UN DESA Population Division, Day of Eight Billion
  20. [20] PBS NewsHour (AP), Argentina wins World Cup
  21. [21] USGS, M7.8 and M7.5 Kahramanmaraş earthquake sequence
  22. [22] WHO Director-General's remarks, 5 May 2023
  23. [23] Westminster Abbey, Charles III
  24. [24] U.S. Fire Administration, Preliminary After-Action Report: 2023 Maui Wildfire
  25. [25] UN News, three years on from 7 October (5 Oct 2026)
  26. [26] NASA Science, 2024 Total Eclipse: Where & When
  27. [27] U.S. Secret Service one-year update (July 2025)
  28. [28] PBS NewsHour, closing ceremony of the 2024 Paris Olympics
  29. [29] NOAA NCEI, Assessing the U.S. Climate in 2024
  30. [30] National Archives, 2024 Electoral College results
  31. [31] CAL FIRE, Palisades Fire incident page
  32. [32] NTSB investigation DCA25MA108
  33. [33] Holy See, Biography of Pope Leo XIV
  34. [34] NOAA NCEI, U.S. climate report for July 2025
  35. [35] PBS NewsHour, record 43-day shutdown ends
  36. [36] PBS NewsHour (AP), 3 January 2026
  37. [37] PBS NewsHour (AP), 28 February 2026
  38. [38] NASA news release, Artemis II crew returns
  39. [39] FOX 5 DC live coverage, July 4, 2026
  40. [40] CBS News, 2026 FIFA World Cup final
  41. [41] NBA.com: Los Angeles Lakers legend Kobe Bryant dies at 41 in helicopter crash (Jan 27, 2020; died Sunday Jan 26). Birth date: Basketball-Reference.com
  42. [42] NASA: Katherine Johnson Biography ("She died on Feb. 24, 2020")
  43. [43] AP (via OPB): 'Black Panther' star Chadwick Boseman dies of cancer at 43 (died Friday Aug 28, 2020). Birth date from Wikipedia only.
  44. [44] Supreme Court of the United States press release, Sept 18, 2020
  45. [45] FIFA: Planet football mourns Maradona's passing (Nov 26, 2020; died Wednesday)
  46. [46] The Royal Family (royal.uk): announcement of the death of The Duke of Edinburgh, 9 April 2021
  47. [47] NBC News: Joan Didion, masterly prose stylist, dies at 87 (Dec 23, 2021; died Thursday)
  48. [48] CBS News: Betty White died of a stroke she suffered six days earlier (Jan 11, 2022; "her December 31 death at age 99")
  49. [49] CBS News: Mikhail Gorbachev, last leader of the Soviet Union, dies at 91 (Aug 30, 2022)
  50. [50] GOV.UK: Death of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (8 September 2022). Birth date: royal.uk 'Early life and education'
  51. [51] NBC News: Pelé, Brazilian soccer legend, dies at 82 (Dec 29, 2022; died Thursday)
  52. [52] NBC News: Tina Turner dies at 83 after long illness (May 24, 2023; died Wednesday)
  53. [53] NBC News: Matthew Perry died from acute effects of ketamine, medical examiner says (Dec 15, 2023; "died Oct. 28")
  54. [54] Bundesliga.com: tribute a year since his death ("passed away on 7 January 2024 at the age of 78"). Birth year: UEFA.com
  55. [55] University of Edinburgh: Statement on the death of Professor Peter Higgs (died Monday 8 April, aged 94)
  56. [56] CBS News: Alain Delon, French acting legend, dies at 88 (Aug 18, 2024)
  57. [57] GRAMMY.com: Remembering Quincy Jones ("On Nov. 3 ... passed away at the age of 91"). Birth date: NBC News obituary
  58. [58] The Carter Center: Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter Passes Away at 100 (Dec 29, 2024)
  59. [59] AP (via PBS NewsHour): Mario Vargas Llosa, Peruvian author and Nobel laureate, dies at 89 (Apr 14, 2025; died Sunday)
  60. [60] Vatican News: Pope Francis has died on Easter Monday aged 88 (April 21, 2025). Birth date: vatican.va biography
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  72. [72] FDA, FDA Approves First COVID-19 Vaccine
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  75. [75] FDA Office of Women's Health e-update, June 2021
  76. [76] National Archives, Juneteenth
  77. [77] WHO news release, 6 October 2021
  78. [78] NASA news release, Webb's first images
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  80. [80] FDA, OTC Hearing Aids: What You Should Know
  81. [81] Pew Research Center, June 2025
  82. [82] LLNL, NIF's fusion ignition shot hailed as historic
  83. [83] FDA, First Gene Therapies to Treat Sickle Cell Disease
  84. [84] U.S. National Science Foundation, Arecibo Observatory
  85. [85] Adobe, Flash Player End of Life
  86. [86] Microsoft Lifecycle announcement
  87. [87] La Poste, Fin du timbre rouge
  88. [88] Boeing press release, delivery of final 747
  89. [89] BASE (German Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management)
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  91. [91] Netflix, Thanks for Watching
  92. [92] Microsoft Support, Skype is retiring in May 2025
  93. [93] U.S. Treasury press release, 14 August 2025
  94. [94] Microsoft Support, Windows 10 support has ended
  95. [95] PBS NewsHour (AP), 12 November 2025
  96. [96] Maryland General Assembly: HB0240 (2021 Regular Session)
  97. [97] National Archives: 1950 Census Fact Sheet
  98. [98] Library and Archives Canada: The 1931 Census is now online!
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  107. [107] National Archives Records Express blog: Transitioning to a Fully Digital Government (25 April 2024)
Next in the seriesThe 2010s, coming soon. Then the 2000s, the 1990s, and on back in time.

Updated October 15, 2026.

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