How active has the 2025 hurricane season been?
6
18
Storms are categorized primarily by wind speed. Tropical storms have maximum speeds of 39 to 73 mph. Hurricanes are on a five-part scale, in which category 3 or higher is considered a “major hurricane.” Classification is as follows:
- Tropical depression: less than 38 mph
- Tropical storm: 39 to 73 mph
- Category 1 hurricane: 74 to 95 mph
- Category 2: 96 to 110 mph
- Category 3: 111 to 129 mph
- Category 4: 130 to 156 mph
- Category 5: 157 or more mph
So far in 2025, five tropical storms and one hurricane have formed over the Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea. All sixoccurred during the official Atlantic hurricane season, which is considered June 1 to November 30. There were 18 tropical storms in all of 2024. A total of 11 reached hurricane strength winds, and five of those were classified as major hurricanes.
So far during the 2025 Atlantic hurricane season, six storms reaching tropical storm strength have formed.
Storms grouped by year and month of start, through Aug, 25, 2025
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NOAA has tracked the path of each Atlantic Ocean cyclone using various types of sources, including satellite data, aircraft reconnaissance, and ship and newspaper accounts (especially for earlier years, going back to 1851.)
The busiest year on record was 2020, when 30 storms reached tropical storm status. During that year, there were 14 hurricanes, seven of which were considered major hurricanes.
On average, 18 storms reaching at least tropical storm status took shape in the Atlantic Ocean every year between 2015 to 2024, the highest 10-year average on record.
In 2020, 30 storms in the Atlantic Ocean reached at least tropical storm strength, the most of any year on record.
Atlantic Ocean storms by type
Even without making landfall, a storm can still bring dangerous winds to coastal areas. So far in 2025, two storms have brought tropical-storm-force winds to the North American coastline. Only one, Tropical Storm Chantal in July, pushed those winds onto US land.
So far in 2025, tropical-storm-force winds have reached US soil one time.
Wind swath by storm system, as of Aug. 25, 2025
Since 2015, about two in five of US counties have experienced tropical-storm-force winds from Atlantic storms. Among them, about 300 counties have experienced hurricane-strength winds from tropical storms.
Since 2015, 42% of US counties have experienced tropical-storm-force winds from Atlantic storms.
Counties shaded in purple experienced at least tropical-storm-strength winds (39+ mph) from at least one storm since 2015.
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Methodology
USAFacts standardizes data, in areas such as time and demographics, to make it easier to understand and compare.
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USAFacts endeavors to share the most up-to-date information available. We sourced the data on this page directly from government agencies; however, the intervals at which agencies publish updated data vary.