The world's wind pipeline is 2.3 times its fleet. Most of it is still on paper.
2,674 GW of wind is under construction, consented or planned worldwide, against 1,171 GW turning today. But only 310 GW is actually being built, and more than two-thirds of that is in China.
We track 26,777 wind farms in 132 countries, combining Global Energy Monitor's Global Wind Power Tracker with national registers for the UK, the United States and Canada, and Europe's offshore data. Put together, they show a pipeline of 2,674 GW of new wind: more than twice the 1,171 GW operating in the same list. Global Energy Monitor puts its own tracker's total at about 2.66 TW.
That headline flatters the industry. Most of the pipeline is projects at their earliest stage, and the building that is happening is concentrated in very few places.
The operating fleet against the pipeline, by stage
Most of the pipeline is planned, not built or consented
Of the 2,674 GW, 2,325 GW (87%) is planned: projects that have been announced or are still seeking permits, land or finance. Just 39 GW is recorded as consented and waiting to build. That stage is only reported separately in the UK register and Europe's offshore data, so elsewhere consented projects sit within "planned".
Global Energy Monitor's own figures show how early much of this is. Of the 2,338 GW its tracker lists before construction, 1,038 GW (44%) is merely announced. The rest, 1,300 GW, is in what it calls pre-construction. The tracker also lists a further 802 GW of wind as shelved or cancelled, which we leave out.
The 310 GW under construction is real momentum all the same. It is more than a quarter of the fleet operating today.
More than two-thirds of the building is in China
China has 213 GW of wind under construction: 69% of the world's total, and more than twice as much as every other country put together. India follows with 26 GW (8.5%). Together with Egypt, the top three countries account for 82% of all wind being built; everywhere else, about 70 GW is under way. Global Energy Monitor's July 2026 brief on China, using newer data than its February tracker, puts China's figure even higher, at 251 GW, against 102 GW in the rest of the world.
Wind under construction, by country
Offshore: twelve gigawatts planned for every one turning
The gap is widest at sea. The world has 95 GW of offshore wind operating in our data (GWEC counted 92.5 GW at the end of 2025) and 1,129 GW in the offshore pipeline, a ratio of almost 12 to 1. Onshore, the ratio is 1.4 to 1.
Our data shows 45 GW of offshore wind under construction, and China accounts for 26 GW (58%) of it. That total is on the low side: GWEC counts more than 50 GW, because registers are slow to record construction starts. The UK is the largest builder outside China: RenewableUK counts a record 11.5 GW under way, where the government register still shows 8.9 GW.
Most of the offshore pipeline sits where there is no offshore industry yet. Nine countries with less than 1 GW of offshore wind operating each have more than 20 GW planned, 697 GW between them: 62% of the world's offshore pipeline. Brazil leads with 248 GW, which matches the licence applications filed with its environmental regulator, IBAMA, many of them for overlapping sea areas. Then come Sweden (114 GW), the Philippines (69 GW), Australia (63 GW), Italy (51 GW), Ireland (51 GW), South Korea (43 GW), Japan (37 GW) and Poland (21 GW).
A handful of giant projects
Size is concentrated too. Thirty-four projects of 5 GW or more account for 332 GW, 12% of the whole pipeline, and twelve of 10 GW or more account for 200 GW. The largest are mostly tied to green hydrogen or power exports:
- Western Green Energy Hub, Australia: 35.0 GW
- Megaton Moon Hybrid Wind, Mauritania: 30.0 GW
- Hyrasia One, Kazakhstan: 26.9 GW
- AMAN Green Hydrogen, Mauritania: 18.0 GW
- Asian Renewable Energy Hub, Australia: 16.4 GW
- Oman Green Energy, Oman: 12.0 GW
- Australia-Asia PowerLink, Australia: 12.0 GW
Mauritania shows the effect: 59.5 GW in the pipeline, against 0.1 GW operating.
North America is the exception
Every continent's pipeline is larger than its fleet except North America's, where 102 GW is in the pipeline against 192 GW operating. The United States has 79 GW in the pipeline and 162 GW operating.
That partly reflects the data. Global Energy Monitor tracks projects of 10 MW and more once they are public, and grid connection queues, which hold many early-stage projects, are not included. The comparison is closest for projects that are building or close to it.
Operating and pipeline, by continent
The fifteen biggest pipelines
| Country | Pipeline (GW) | Building (GW) | Operating (GW) | Pipeline ÷ operating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| China | 743.6 | 212.8 | 555.6 | 1.3× |
| Brazil | 277.9 | 1.5 | 40.8 | 6.8× |
| Australia | 250.3 | 1.6 | 15.2 | 16.5× |
| Sweden | 121.9 | 1.1 | 16.6 | 7.3× |
| Philippines | 107.2 | 0.3 | 0.6 | – |
| United States | 78.9 | 9.1 | 161.7 | 0.5× |
| Mauritania | 59.5 | 0.0 | 0.1 | – |
| United Kingdom | 59.5 | 10.9 | 31.4 | 1.9× |
| Spain | 56.5 | 1.4 | 34.4 | 1.6× |
| Ireland | 54.1 | 0.3 | 4.5 | 12.0× |
| Germany | 53.4 | 2.1 | 51.5 | 1.0× |
| Italy | 52.0 | 0.0 | 10.4 | 5.0× |
| India | 51.1 | 26.4 | 41.8 | 1.2× |
| South Korea | 49.5 | 1.8 | 1.7 | 29.1× |
| Egypt | 47.9 | 13.4 | 3.0 | 16.0× |
"–": less than 1 GW operating. The full table for 131 countries is free to download. Each country's farms are on its country page.
What to watch
A pipeline measures ambition, not supply. The numbers that will decide how much of the 2,674 GW is built are further down the chain: consents granted, grid connections agreed, contracts and auctions won, and construction started. We'll keep tracking them in Wind Watch.
Method and sources
- Farms from Global Energy Monitor's Global Wind Power Tracker (February 2026, CC BY 4.0; projects of 10 MW and more), the UK's Renewable Energy Planning Database (Open Government Licence), the US Wind Turbine Database, the Canadian Wind Turbine Database, EMODnet Human Activities (CC BY 4.0) and the WRI's Global Power Plant Database. Where sources overlap, each farm is counted once, from the most detailed source.
- Stages as each source records them. "Planned" covers Global Energy Monitor's announced and pre-construction projects and the UK register's planning stages. Shelved, cancelled and decommissioned projects are excluded.
- The 1,171 GW operating in our list is 91% of the world's wind capacity at the end of 2025 (1,291 GW according to IRENA and Ember; GWEC reports 1,299 GW). The rest is mostly smaller farms outside the UK, the US and Canada.
- Figures as of 22 October 2026, from the farm list behind the Wind app. Questions about the method: mail@revolutionenergy.net.
Checked against published figures: Global Energy Monitor's own pipeline total (about 2.66 TW, February 2026) and its July 2026 China brief (251 GW under construction); world capacity from GWEC (1,299 GW) and IRENA (1,291 GW) for the end of 2025; offshore from GWEC's Global Offshore Wind Report 2026 (92.5 GW operating at the end of 2025, more than 50 GW under construction); RenewableUK (11.5 GW of UK offshore wind under construction, June 2026); and IBAMA's offshore licence applications for Brazil (about 247 GW in 2025). Where our figures differ, the article says so.
Correction, 22 October 2026: after publication we found some large offshore projects counted twice, where Global Energy Monitor and EMODnet place the same project tens of kilometres apart (mostly in Sweden and the Netherlands). We fixed how the sources are merged and updated every figure: the pipeline is 2,674 GW, not 2,722 GW, and Sweden's 122 GW, not 149 GW. The findings are unchanged.
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