Companies investing in a cleaner environment through net-zero commitments are holding their ground, despite pressure. According to the Net Zero Tracker, 1926 governments and companies, representing 47% of the total, still have net zero or similar targets, unchanged from 2025. 

This year's sixth annual Net Zero Stocktake report is produced by NewClimate Institute in collaboration with the Net Zero Tracker partners Oxford Net Zero, the Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit and Data-Driven EnviroLab. It assesses the quantity and quality of net zero and similar targets set by more than 4,000 countries, states and regions, cities and companies and looks at how they have changed since the last stocktake in September 2025.

Main Insights

Countries: 137 of 198 national governments have net zero targets, as last year. Every G20 member except the US has a net zero target.

Of existing national commitments, 73% are now enshrined in law or formal policy, up from 67% in 2025.

Companies: net zero targets cover 64% of tracked publicly listed companies, broadly unchanged from 2025. Together, these companies account for nearly $40 trillion in annual revenue.

The share of US companies with net zero targets has stayed broadly stable, going from 52% to 51%.

Chinese companies are catching up from a low base: 28% now have a net zero target, up from 23% in 2025.

The accountability gap: 38% of all tracked entities, around 1,540 governments and companies, have neither a long- nor short-term emissions target.

Among publicly listed companies, 384 have no mitigation target. Nearly three-quarters of these are based in the US or China.

Target integrity: 89% of companies with net zero targets now also have an interim target and 78% have published implementation plans, up from 69% last year.

Still, only 11% meet all seven minimum procedural criteria we assess, up from 7% in 2025. For states and regions and for cities, the equivalent shares are 7% and 5%, respectively.

Corporate backtracking: our new analysis of the 50 largest Forbes Global 2000 companies finds that more are weakening or dropping emission reduction targets than strengthening them.

Net zero headlines are rarely dropped outright; instead, they are more often narrowed, made conditional, or recast as aspirations, while the interim targets that would make them credible are loosened or removed. A fifth of negative changes come without any explanation. 

Recommendations

The report makes the following recommendations for three specific groups.

• Policymakers should ask for explanations where targets are weakened, dropped or left to lapse without comment, rather than treating headline target counts as a sufficient measure of progress.
• Voluntary standard-setters, such as the Science Based Targets initiative and the International Organization for Standardization, should keep tightening minimum criteria on interim targets, carbon-credit use and full value-chain coverage, so that stronger targets on paper also mean stronger targets in practice.
• Investors should scrutinize not only whether portfolio companies have net zero targets, but whether those targets are maintained, strengthened or quietly weakened over time, using this closer attention to distinguish companies that follow through on their commitments from those that step back.