The 2020s (pronounced "twenty-twenties" or "two thousand [and] twenties"; shortened to "the '20s" and also known as "The Twenties") is the current decade that began on 1 January 2020, and will end on 31 December 2029.

The 2020s began with the COVID-19 pandemic. The first reports of the virus were published on 31 December 2019, though the first cases are said to have appeared nearly a month earlier. The pandemic led to a global economic recession, a sustained rise in global inflation for the first time since the 1970s, and a global supply chain crisis.

Several anti-government demonstrations and revolts occurred in the late 2010s and early 2020s, including a continuation of those in Hong Kong against extradition legislation; protests against certain local, state and national responses to the COVID-19 pandemic; others around the world, particularly in the United States, against racism and police brutality; one in India against agriculture and farming acts; one in Israel against judicial reforms; another in Indonesia against the omnibus law on jobs; protests and strikes in France against pension reform; political crises in Peru, Bangladesh, Armenia, and Thailand; and many in Belarus, Eswatini, Myanmar, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Iran, China, Russia, and Venezuela against various forms of governmental jurisdiction, corruption and authoritarianism; along with citizen riots in Japan, the United States, and Brazil in an attempt to overturn election results. The world population grew to over 8 billion people, and in 2023, India overtook China as the most populous country in the world.

Ongoing military conflicts include the Myanmar civil war, the Ethiopian civil conflict, the Kivu conflict, the Mali War, the Yemeni civil war, the Somali Civil War, Sudanese civil war, the Syrian civil war, the Russo-Ukrainian War, and the Gaza war. The year 2021 saw the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan and the fall of Kabul to the Taliban, ending nearly 20 years of war in Afghanistan. The Russian invasion of Ukraine became the largest conventional military offensive in Europe since World War II, resulting in a refugee crisis, disruptions to global trade, and an exacerbation of economic inflation. In 2023, a Hamas-led attack marked the first invasion of Israel since 1948, triggering an Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip, a Palestinian territory. The invasion has led to the displacement of nearly all 2.3 million Gaza residents, a humanitarian crisis, a famine, and a polio epidemic, sparking global protests against Israel. In 2024, a quick and renewed rebel offensive during the Syrian civil war led to the toppling of Bashar al-Assad and the fall of the Assad regime. Smaller conflicts include the insurgency in the Maghreb, the Iraq insurgency, the Philippine and the Mexican drug wars. (Full article...)