Israel, US Lead Rank Among Countries with Biggest Military Spending

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - In 2025, the global military spending rose to $2.88 trillion, up by 2.9 percent from the previous year, according to a latest report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), as quoted from Al Jazeera. In comparison, militaries worldwide spent about $1.981 trillion in 2020.

Military spending typically accounts for the budget required to build and maintain military power to enforce domestic and foreign policies and protect the country's citizens. While the size of the military varies in each country, it is generally understood that the expenditures rise during wartime and falls during peaceful periods.

So, which country spent the most for their militaries?

US Tops List of Countries with Biggest Military Spending

Unsurprisingly, the US has one of the largest militaries among other nations, and the biggest spender each year since 1945. In 2025 alone, the US spent a whopping $954 billion, which it distributed across various programs, including the Department of Defense's regular activities, nuclear weapons, war spending, international military assistance, and others, as quoted from World Population Review. 

America is far ahead of other countries in terms of military spending. Follows behind the US with less than half of its extraordinary figure is China with $336 billion in 2025. 

The next biggest military spenders are Russia with $190 billion, Germany with $114 billion, India with $92 billion, the UK with $89 billion, and Ukraine with $84 billion.

Israel, which has been running a massive military campaign against neighboring countries and the occupied Palestine, surprisingly falls lower in the list—nestled between Japan ($62.2 billion) and Italy ($48.1 billion)—with $48.3 billion.

Citing SIPRI data, CNN noted this spending was down 4.9 percent from the year earlier, influenced by the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas earlier in January 2025.

Israel Leads Rank Among OECD Countries, Relative to GDP

While the US spent the largest for its military undertakings, Statista noted that this amounted only to 3.1 percent of the US' gross domestic product (GDP). This places the country lower than Ukraine, Israel, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, and Russia.

Ukraine, which entered its fourth year fighting against Russian invasion, saw an estimated 40 percent of its GDP for military spending.

Among the countries registered as members of the economic bloc OECD, Israel spent the most for its military relative to its GDP, at 7.81 percent. This is driven largely by the intensive multi-front conflict in the Middle East region, as the country spent an average of 5.01 percent between 2015 and 2022.

Citing Visual Capitalist, the top 10 biggest military spenders in terms of GDP share in 2025 are as follows:

1. Israel (7.81%)
2. Poland (4.50%)
3. Latvia (3.61%)
4. Estonia (3.37%)
5. Norway (3.28%)
6. Denmark (3.25%)
7. Colombia (3.20%)
8. United States (3.12%)
9. Lithuania (3.08%)
10. Greece (2.99%)

It is worth noting that the members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), 26 of which are also OECD countries, pledged to spend 5 percent of GDP on security-related priorities by 2035, including 3.5 percent on core defense. Of these countries, Poland and Latvia have exceeded the threshold already by 2025. Both countries share borders with Russia and Belarus—with Poland also sharing borders with Ukraine.

Wartime expansion

Statista noted that the global military spending has grown steadily over the years, driven by the Russia-Ukraine war that broke out in 2022 and Israel's genocidal war on Gaza the following year, as well as the growing tensions in the South China Sea. 

Meanwhile, Al Jazeera flagged down the pattern of wartime expansion in military spending, dating back to the post-World War II period. 

By the 1950s, military spending surged from $284bn in 1950 to $788bn by 1953, reflecting the impact of the Korean War. The spending crossed $1 trillion for the first time in the late 1960s, which was driven largely by the Vietnam War and the arms race between the US and the Soviet Union, peaking at $1.7 trillion by 1988.

After the September 11, 2001 attacks, the long US-led war on Afghanistan and Iraq saw global military spending surpass $2 trillion for the first time in 2009.

The year 2025 marks another milestone in global military spending with nearly $2.9 trillion, marking a 41 percent increase from 2016, which saw $1.69 trillion.

Read: Why Is Israel's Military Presence Growing in Syria?

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