As of 2026, nine sovereign states are known or believed to possess nuclear weapons: the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, and Israel.
Notes on verification
Confirmed by multiple authoritative, independent sources (UCS, Arms Control Association, UK Parliament, Our World in Data, ICAN), all consistent on the list of nine states as of 2026, including Israel's undeclared but widely believed status. [tier=unverified indep_score=0.3 clusters=5 claim_tier=notable] [rescored 2026-09-15: curated origin-host map (PR #65); unclassified hosts no longer scored as aggregators]
Sources
- Nuclear weapon (wikipedia)
- https://www.ucs.org/nuclear-weapons/worldwide (corroboration)
- https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/nuclear-weapons-who-has-what-glance (corroboration)
- https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9092/ (corroboration)
- https://ourworldindata.org/nuclear-weapons (corroboration)
- https://www.icanw.org/nuclear_armed_nations (corroboration)