Methodology · version 2026-11-v2
How the War Detector Index is calculated
The index runs from 0 to 100 and sums up how close the international situation is to escalating into a global conflict. It is a statistical indicator built from public data, not a real probability or a forecast. It is recalculated every hour.
1. Risk of each conflict (0 to 100)
Each active conflict gets a score, the weighted sum of three factors:
- Intensity (45%): deaths in the last 90 days, on a logarithmic scale. It peaks at 10,000 deaths.
- Trend (20%): the daily average of violent events in the last 30 days compared with the last 180 days.
- International involvement (35%): the number of states involved, whether a nuclear power or a permanent Security Council member takes part, and whether the war is between states.
2. Global index
Each component below adds points. The total goes through a saturation curve, 100 × (1 − e−points/60), which keeps the result between 0 and 100. Every country that goes to war always raises the index, but the number never exceeds 100.
| Component | Rule | Now |
|---|---|---|
| Countries at war | +1 per country | 44 |
| Nuclear powers at war | +4 per power | 20 |
| Permanent members of the UN Security Council | +3 per member | 6 |
| Defense alliance members at war | +5 per country | 10 |
| Nuclear powers on opposite sides | +12 | 0 |
| US, Russia or China on opposite sides | +25 | 0 |
| Continents affected | +1.5 per continent | 9 |
| Average conflict risk | up to +10 | 2.72 |
| Total points → index | 91.72 → 78.3 |
- Nuclear powers at war: Pakistan, Israel, United States, India, Russia
- Alliances triggered: NATO, US–Japan Treaty, US–South Korea Treaty, US–Philippines Treaty, ANZUS, CSTO, Russia–North Korea Treaty (by United States, Russia)
An alliance counts as triggered when a member fights a country outside it directly and other members are still out of the war and could be dragged into it. Each member country at war adds points once, even if it belongs to several treaties: the US at war counts as a single source of escalation. The lists of nuclear powers, permanent members and alliances are reviewed by the team.
3. Bands
- Stable0–20
- Tension20–40
- Alert40–60
- Critical60–80
- Extreme80–100
4. Sources
- UCDP Georeferenced Event Dataset, from the Uppsala Conflict Data Program: organized violence events with confirmed deaths. CC BY 4.0 license. We use the GED Candidate release, published monthly with a 1 to 2 month lag; current data runs through 2026-09-30. That is why the 90-day window counts back from the most recent event in the database, not from today.
- The GDELT Project: news-reported events worldwide, every 15 minutes. We only use assaults, fights and mass violence (CAMEO codes 18 to 20) to measure the trend.
- Natural Earth: country borders (public domain).
5. Limitations
Conflict data arrives late and may be revised. GDELT measures what is reported, not what actually happens, so regions with little press coverage show up less. The weights are editorial choices, published here and versioned. Any change creates a new version.