Over 168,000 Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine identified by media investigation
Russian independent media outlet Mediazona, in collaboration with the BBC Russian service, has confirmed the identities of 168,142 Russian military personnel killed in Ukraine.
Since the media outlets' last update in mid-January, the names of 4,536 Russian soldiers have been added to the list of casualties.
The journalists note that the actual figures are likely significantly higher, as their verified information comes from public sources such as obituaries, posts by relatives, regional media reports, and statements from local authorities.
The confirmed death toll now includes over 54,600 volunteers, 20,200 recruited prisoners, and 17,400 mobilized soldiers, according to the media outlets. A total of 6,353 officers have also been confirmed to have been killed.
Moscow and Kyiv rarely officially report their losses. The journalists note that the Kremlin has stepped up efforts in recent months to remove court records from Russian families filing lawsuits against the state to determine the status of Russian soldiers' fate on the battlefield, including whether they are missing or dead.
The latest numbers come amid the publication of a new report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, indicating that Russia has suffered "more losses than any major power in any war since World War II."
The Jan. 27 report estimates that Russian forces have sustained nearly 1.2 million casualties — including troops killed, wounded or missing — since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion in Feb. 2022. As many as 325,000 Russian soldiers have been killed, the report found.
The report is in line with estimates maintained by Ukraine's General Staff that reports, as of Jan. 31, Russia has lost 1,239,590 troops in Ukraine since the start of the war on Feb. 24, 2022. The findings are also largely in line with estimates made by Western intelligence agencies.
Despite the heavy losses, Russia has been able to make marginal advances in Ukraine's front line region as it is able to offset its casualties through fresh contract soldiers. The Ukrainian open-source mapping project DeepState reported that Russian forces occupied 4,336 square kilometers (1,674 square miles) of Ukrainian territory in 2025, accounting for less than 1% of the country
In turn, Kyiv has faced increasingly serious manpower shortages, particularly among infantry units holding the front line. In a rare report, Ukraine's new Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said on Jan. 14 that two million Ukrainians are wanted for evading mobilization, and another 200,000 soldiers are absent without official leave (AWOL), as infantry units continue to struggle to refill heavy losses.
The outlet published the complete list of identified casualties for the first time in February, marking three years since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. According to the publication, volunteers manually enter and verify each record to prevent duplicate entries in the database.
