How many UFO sightings are reported every day?

Why the UAP phenomenon is a case study in how humans process unexplained evidence

The UFO/UAP phenomenon is unusual because it occupies a space where credible observations meet poor documentation and motivated interpretation. The US government's own classification of sightings is instructive: roughly 80% are resolved as conventional objects or atmospheric phenomena. The remaining ~20% are classified as "unresolved" - not because they defy physics, but because the data collected is insufficient to make a determination. That ambiguity is not evidence of anything exotic; it is evidence of the limits of human observation.

Since the US government declassified several Navy pilot videos in 2017, UAP sightings filed with NUFORC spiked dramatically. This illustrates a core epistemological problem: the reporting population is not random. People who file UAP reports are more likely to be primed to see anomalies. Congressional hearings between 2022-2024 brought testimony from retired military personnel who claimed personal knowledge of non-human spacecraft. These claims were not corroborated by any physical evidence or official investigation.

For a person interested in this topic, the most useful mental model is this: UAP reports are a real and documented phenomenon, the vast majority resolve to ordinary explanations, and the extraordinary claim - extraterrestrial craft - requires extraordinary evidence that has not yet been provided to the public. The counter above counts reports filed today. What those reports actually represent is still, genuinely, unknown for a small fraction of them.

UAP by the numbers: 23,600 reports per year, 80% resolved

UFO sightings vs. confirmed alien contacts, today

The gap between what people report and what science has confirmed is the most striking number in this dataset.

From Roswell to congressional hearings: UFO/UAP history

1. 1947Kenneth Arnold sighting and Roswell incident: modern UFO era begins; USAF Project Sign investigation launched
2. 1969US Air Force Project Blue Book concludes; 12,618 UFO cases investigated; 701 officially "unexplained"
3. 1974NUFORC founded; begins collecting public UAP/UFO reports
4. 2017Pentagon releases authenticated UAP videos from USS Nimitz; congressional concern triggers modern UAP investigations
5. 2022AARO established; congressional UAP hearings held; NUFORC records ~5,471 US reports (peak)
6. 2023NASA UAP study: no extraterrestrial evidence; Grusch congressional testimony claims government UAP programs
7. 2025NUFORC's year-end database confirms 4,550 US sightings for the full 2025 calendar year; MUFON logs 4,888 globally

Annual UFO/UAP reports 2017-2025: the NUFORC dataset

The US government's 2021 UAP (Unidentified Aerial Phenomena) report and subsequent Congressional hearings normalised reporting. In 2025, MUFON recorded 4,888 sightings globally and NUFORC logged 4,550 US sightings across the full year — the vast majority attributed to known objects, drones, and atmospheric phenomena.

UAP: what 23,600 sighting reports tell us, and what they don't

Notable UAP incidents & research

In perspective

How the number is calculated

NUFORC's own database confirms 4,550 US reports for the full 2025 calendar year, while MUFON logged 4,888 sightings globally in the same year. Combined, that's ~9,400 formal US reports; scaling up on the same assumption used in prior years, that the US accounts for about 40% of global formal UAP reporting, puts the global total near 23,600 reports/year ÷ 8,760 hours ≈ 2.7/hr. The counter shows cumulative sightings today. Note: NUFORC reports are unverified; ~80% have conventional explanations when investigated.

Sources: see below. Full methodology: methodology page.

Frequently asked questions

How many UFO/UAP sightings are reported each year?

NUFORC's database confirms 4,550 US reports for the full 2025 calendar year. MUFON recorded 4,888 sightings globally in 2025. Combined formal reports suggest ~9,400 US reports annually; globally scaled, estimates reach ~23,600 formal UAP reports per year. The rate is ~2.7 global formal reports per hour.

What percentage of UAP reports remain unexplained?

The US AARO has resolved approximately 80% of government-referred UAP cases as conventional objects (drones, weather balloons, aircraft, optical illusions, etc.). About 20% remain "unresolved" due to insufficient data quality (poor video, single-observer reports), not because they are unexplained in principle. NUFORC notes that the vast majority of reports have conventional explanations upon investigation.

Has the number of UAP reports increased in recent years?

Yes. NUFORC data shows a general upward trend in reports, with spikes correlated to media attention (e.g., the 2019 US military UAP video releases, congressional hearings). The rise of smartphones and better cameras has also increased the quantity of recorded sightings. The 2022 congressional UAP hearings and establishment of AARO have further encouraged reporting.