The Great War

19,700,000

estimated total dead

Each dot below represents 1,000 human lives. Scroll to watch the scale unfold.

Military Dead

9,700,000 soldiers killed in combat, from wounds, or from disease. Each = 1,000 lives.

Allied Powers — 5,700,000 military dead

Central Powers — 4,000,000 military dead

Civilian Dead

10,000,000 civilians killed — from violence, famine, disease, and displacement. Wars are not fought only by soldiers.

Civilian dead — 10,000,000

Deadliest Engagements

Brusilov Offensive1,800,000

Somme1,100,000

Passchendaele850,000

Verdun700,000

First Marne500,000

Spring Offensive500,000

Gallipoli474,000

Jutland25,000

For Perspective

How WWI's dead compare to other conflicts and events.

WWI — total dead19,700,000

U.S. Civil War total dead620,000

U.S. deaths in WWI116,708

Population of London (1914)7,500,000

U.S. deaths in WWII405,399

Milestones of Loss

116,708 dead

U.S. military deaths — in a war that lasted 19 months for America

620,000 dead

Total U.S. Civil War dead — surpassed on the Western Front in 1915 alone

1,000,000 dead

One million dead — the Somme and Verdun each approached this alone

5,700,000 dead

Allied military dead — France lost 4% of its entire population

9,700,000 dead

Total military dead — nearly 10 million soldiers killed

19,700,000 dead

Military + civilian dead — 20 million total, not counting the Spanish Flu

All figures are historical estimates and vary across sources. The true human cost of war is impossible to fully quantify — these numbers represent the best scholarly consensus. Each number was a person with a name, a family, and a life unlived.