Advancing 30 miles at the cost of 100,000 troops: Key figures from the third year of the Russia-Ukraine war

RU

Russian territorial gains in Ukraine over the year: 3,600 square kilometers

Since October 2023, Russia has been conducting an uninterrupted offensive in Ukraine. It began with the assault on Avdiivka in the outskirts of Donetsk and gradually spread to adjacent areas, ultimately affecting approximately 200 kilometers of the front line in the Donetsk Region. Some advances were made in eastern Kharkiv Oblast, and in May 2024, Russian forces launched an operation aimed at moving toward Kharkiv itself.

The Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) have spent most of the year on the defensive. However, in August 2024, they unexpectedly crossed into Russia’s Kursk Region and continue to hold approximately 400 square kilometers of internationally recognized Russian territory — including the district center of Sudzha. As a result, after three years of war, combat operations have become increasingly fragmented, with some areas remaining static for long periods of time — as in the northern Kharkiv Region and parts of the Zaporizhzhia Region — while in Donetsk Region, Ukrainian forces are slowly retreating.

Despite these developments, the overall changes on the front remain minor when mapped. Even in the most successful Russian advance — from Avdiivka toward Pokrovsk — Russian forces have moved only 45-50 kilometers deeper over the past year.

In terms of occupied land, Russian forces have seized a total of 3,600 square kilometers of Ukrainian territory over the past year, more than 70% of which is in the Donetsk Region. They have also reclaimed 380 square kilometers of the 769 square kilometers they had lost in the Kursk Region.

Within Ukraine’s internationally recognized borders, these territorial changes have increased Kremlin-controlled territory from 17.6% to 18.2% — a figure that includes occupied Crimea and the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk “People’s Republics,” which were already under Russian control before February 2022.

According to estimates by the Ukrainian open source intelligence (OSINT) project DeepState, since February 2022, Russian forces have captured and maintained control over 68,400 square kilometers — though over 60,000 square kilometers of that territory was taken in 2022-2023. At the current pace of advance, it would take the Kremlin more than two years to fully capture the Donetsk Region, where the AFU still controls over 8,000 square kilometers.

In order to fully occupy Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions, Russian forces would also need to seize around 8,000 square kilometers in each, while in Luhansk, they are within 200 square kilometers of reaching the administrative borders.

At least 100,000 killed

The Russian government continues to withhold official casualty figures. The last official count of Moscow’s losses in Ukraine came from then-Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu in 2022, when he claimed Russia had suffered only 5,000 soldiers killed — a number already significantly at odds with outside estimates.

BBC News Russian and the independent exiled publication Mediazona, with the help of a team of volunteers, have since used open sources to identify the names of 95,000 Russian military personnel killed in the war as of Feb. 21, 2025.

Based on the assumption that publicly reported deaths represent 45% to 65% of the total, the overall number of Russian fatalities is estimated to be between 146,000 and 211,000. When including losses from the “DPR” and “LPR” forces — which fought separately from February to September 2022 before being formally integrated into the Russian military — the total number of combat fatalities on the Russian side could range from 167,000 to 235,000.

Even the lower estimate of 167,000 killed exceeds Russian and Soviet losses in all conflicts since 1945 combined.

Over the past year, the BBC-Mediazona list of named casualties has grown by 51,000, suggesting that anywhere from 78,000 to 113,000 Russian soldiers were killed in combat in 2024 alone.

On the Ukrainian side, the UALosses project, which also tracks soldiers killed in action using open source data, has recorded over 70,000 confirmed fatalities and 56,000 soldiers listed as missing. Given the nature of the war, the “missing” category is made up mostly of soldiers who have been killed but whose bodies have not been recovered from the battlefield. This suggests that Ukrainian military deaths likely exceed 120,000.

Determining Ukraine’s annual combat losses is more difficult, as UALosses initially tracked only confirmed fatalities. However, between March 11, 2024, and Feb. 24, 2025, the list of named Ukrainian war dead grew by 25,000.

Based on these figures, the total minimum estimate of combined Russian and Ukrainian combat deaths in the past year is between 100,000 and 110,000.

Notably, up to one-third of Russia’s known casualties are prison inmates, and around 20% are from the “DPR” and “LPR.” This means that roughly half of all of Russia’s war dead were not fully integrated into Russian society before the war. Their deaths have had little impact on public sentiment, as most high-income urban residents in Russia remain largely insulated from the war’s human costs.

Public involvement: 80% in Ukraine vs. 30% in Russia

Sociological surveys — despite their limitations — indicate that Russians remain minimally involved in the war.

According to independent polls carried out by the Chronicles project in September 2024, only 2% of respondents in Russia had personally participated in combat, while 28% said a relative had fought or was still fighting.

A Russian Field survey found that 9% of respondents had close relatives involved in the war, and that 1% were engaged in military-related volunteer work.

Since the war had not significantly affected Russian territory until August 2024, the number of Russian civilians directly impacted by the conflict remained relatively low.

By contrast, a similar Ukrainian survey conducted in May-June 2023 found that 78% of respondents had a friend or relative who had been killed or wounded in the war. Another survey, published in August 2024, indicated that more than 70% of Ukrainians had provided some form of assistance to the AFU. However, volunteer organizations have reported a noticeable decline in financial donations from civilians of late.

650,000 soldiers in the trenches

Russia’s troop grouping along the front line and in rear areas consists of between 580,000 and 617,000 personnel (1, 2). Experts note that despite significant challenges, the Russian military-political leadership has managed to sustain an army of over 600,000 troops for an extended period following the announcement of “partial” mobilization in late 2022. However, there are increasing signs that the recruitment rate is failing to compensate for mounting losses.

The AFU boast 880,000 troops, and when factoring in other security forces — including the National Guard, police, and border service — Ukraine’s total military personnel count surpasses 1 million. However, a large portion of these troops are deployed in rear areas, securing potential threat zones where no active combat is taking place, such as along the border with Belarus. Others are undergoing training, whether in country or abroad.

Western estimates suggest that 250,000 Ukrainian troops are directly engaged on the front lines, facing 400,000 Russian troops, bringing the total number of actively fighting soldiers to 650,000.

5,000 units of equipment losses

Total heavy equipment and artillery losses for both Russia and Ukraine over the past three years, based on available visual evidence, have surpassed 13,000 units — with 10,000 of those lost by Russia. In the past year alone, Russia has lost 4,000 pieces of heavy equipment — tanks, armored personnel carriers, infantry fighting vehicles, and various artillery systems — while the AFU has lost 1,100 units.

The Insider previously reported that Russian forces are replacing lost equipment primarily by reactivating and refurbishing Soviet-era stockpiles from storage facilities across the country. Western experts widely agree that these reserves will be fully depleted by late 2025 or mid-2026. Available assessments suggest that Russian losses of tanks and armored vehicles have gradually decreased, as they are being replaced in assault operations by civilian vehicles, quad bikes, and motorcycles.

200 billion dollars of annual military spending

For 2025, Russia's military budget is set at 13.5 trillion rubles, equivalent to $150 billion at the current exchange rate ($144 billion based on the average yearly rate). In 2024, Russia spent approximately 13 trillion rubles ($139 billion) on military expenses. Total excess military spending (compared to pre-war levels) between 2022 and 2025 is estimated at 23 trillion rubles, while total actual and planned defense expenditures from 2022 to 2027 will reach 65 trillion rubles.

Ukraine's 2025 defense budget has been approved at 2.2 trillion hryvnias ($53 billion), while 2024 military spending amounted to 2.1 trillion hryvnias ($50 billion). Combined, both sides are spending nearly $200 billion per year on the war.

An overwhelming cost — in lives, equipment, and money

By the third year of the war, the intensity of losses remains high despite minimal shifts in the front line. From February 2024 to February 2025, Russian forces seized 3,600 square kilometers in Ukraine and took back 380 square kilometers in the Kursk Region while losing at least 78,000 troops.

This translates to 21 Russian soldiers killed for every square kilometer gained.

Heavy equipment and artillery losses over the same period exceeded 4,000 units, meaning Russia lost more than one piece of military equipment per square kilometer of territory seized.

Finally, with annual defense expenditures of between 13.0 and 13.5 trillion rubles, each square kilometer captured over the past year has cost the Kremlin approximately 3.7 million rubles (around $40,000).