Over the past 10 months, Russian losses in the war with Ukraine have been growing faster than any time since the start of the full-scale invasion in 2022, according to BBC analysis.
As peace efforts intensified in 2025 under pressure from US President Donald Trump's administration, 40% more obituaries of soldiers were published in Russian sources compared with the previous year.
Overall, the BBC has confirmed the names of almost 160,000 people killed fighting on Russia's side in Ukraine.
BBC News Russian has been counting Russian war losses together with independent outlet Mediazona and a group of volunteers since February 2022. We keep a list of named individuals whose deaths we were able to confirm using official reports, newspapers, social media, and new memorials and graves.
The real death toll is believed to be much higher, and military experts we have consulted believe our analysis of cemeteries, war memorials and obituaries might represent 45-65% of the total.
That would put the number of Russian deaths at between 243,000 and 352,000.
The number of obituaries for any given period serves as a preliminary estimate of the confirmed losses, signaling how the intensity of fighting is changing over time.
2025 started with a relatively low number of published obituaries in January, compared with previous months, followed by a surge in February, when Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin held their first direct talks about ending the war in Ukraine.
The next spike in August coincided with the two presidents meeting in Alaska, viewed as a diplomatic victory for Putin aimed at concluding his international isolation.
In October, when a planned second Russia-US summit was shelved, and in November, when the US presented a 28-point peace proposal, an average of 322 obituaries were published daily—twice the average for 2024.
While it is difficult to attribute the rise in Russian losses to any one factor, the Kremlin views territorial gains as beneficial to influencing negotiations with the US in their favor, with Putin aide Yuri Ushakov stating that recent successes had a positive impact.
Murat Mukashev was among those who gambled on a quick peace deal, ultimately at the cost of his life. Mukashev was an activist who had never supported Putin's policies.
Over the years, he participated in demonstrations against police violence, rallies for LGBT rights, and demanded the release of Alexei Navalny, the Kremlin's main opponent who died in prison in 2024.
He had openly condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine via social media since 2022. However, in early 2024, Mukashev was sentenced to 10 years in prison for drug dealing, a charge many viewed as politically motivated.
In November 2024, he decided to enlist in the army, motivated by hopes of a swift peace deal purportedly promised by Trump. Sadly, he died in an assault in Ukraine on June 11, 2025.
According to NATO, Russian fatalities and injuries in the conflict amount to 1.1 million, with one official estimating around 250,000 deaths. Meanwhile, Ukrainian losses are severe, with President Volodymyr Zelensky citing 46,000 deaths and 380,000 injuries in February, alongside a predicted total of 140,000 dead based on various estimates.
