Nuclear weapons tests per year
What you should know about this indicator
- The number of nuclear tests for the United States does not include the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
- This data only includes nuclear tests announced or reported by governments and/or intergovernmental organizations.
- This data does not include the "Vela Incident" of 1979 because it has not yet officially been declared a nuclear test explosion by any government or intergovernmental organization, although there is strong evidence that suggests it was.
- India's three simultaneous nuclear test explosions on May 11 are counted as only one, as are the two explosions on May 13. Likewise, Pakistan's five simultaneous explosions on May 28 are counted as a single test.
Related research and writing
Sources and processing
This data is based on the following sources
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Citations
How to cite this page
To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:
“Data Page: Nuclear weapons tests per year”, part of the following publication: Bastian Herre, Pablo Rosado, Max Roser and Joe Hasell (2024) - “Nuclear Weapons”. Data adapted from Arms Control Association. Retrieved from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/number-of-nuclear-weapons-tests [online resource]How to cite this data
In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:
Arms Control Association (2023) – with minor processing by Our World in DataFull citation
Arms Control Association (2023) – with minor processing by Our World in Data. “Nuclear weapons tests per year” [dataset]. Arms Control Association, “The Nuclear Testing Tally” [original data]. Retrieved June 9, 2024 from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/number-of-nuclear-weapons-tests