Top 10 Worst Extinction Events in History

The Chicxulub asteroid impact ended the reign of non-avian dinosaurs, killing 76 percent of all species and plunging the planet into years of nuclear winter that collapsed food chains globally.

A prolonged crisis spanning 20 million years eliminated 75 percent of species, devastating reef ecosystems so thoroughly that coral reefs did not fully recover for 100 million years.

Rapid glaciation caused sea levels to plummet, destroying shallow marine habitats and killing 85 percent of marine species in what was the first of the "Big Five" mass extinctions.

Volcanic eruptions from the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province released massive CO2 and sulphur dioxide, eliminating many large terrestrial animals and clearing ecological space for dinosaurs to dominate.

Human activities have driven extinction rates to 100 to 1,000 times the natural background, with an estimated one million species currently at risk from habitat destruction, climate change, and overexploitation.

Woolly mammoths, sabre-toothed cats, giant ground sloths, and other megafauna vanished as humans spread across continents, though whether hunting or climate change was the primary driver remains fiercely debated.

Often overlooked, this mid-Permian event devastated tropical marine communities with an estimated 35 to 47 percent species loss, likely triggered by the Emeishan volcanic eruptions in present-day China.

When cyanobacteria began producing oxygen, they poisoned the anaerobic organisms that dominated early Earth, causing perhaps the largest proportional extinction ever in what scientists call the "Oxygen Catastrophe."

Dramatic global cooling transformed lush forests into open grasslands, driving mass extinctions of tropical marine and terrestrial species while giving rise to the modern fauna of horses, dogs, and grasses.

The Chicxulub asteroid impact ended the reign of non-avian dinosaurs, killing 76 percent of all species and plunging the planet into years of nuclear winter that collapsed food chains globally.

A prolonged crisis spanning 20 million years eliminated 75 percent of species, devastating reef ecosystems so thoroughly that coral reefs did not fully recover for 100 million years.

Rapid glaciation caused sea levels to plummet, destroying shallow marine habitats and killing 85 percent of marine species in what was the first of the "Big Five" mass extinctions.

Volcanic eruptions from the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province released massive CO2 and sulphur dioxide, eliminating many large terrestrial animals and clearing ecological space for dinosaurs to dominate.

Human activities have driven extinction rates to 100 to 1,000 times the natural background, with an estimated one million species currently at risk from habitat destruction, climate change, and overexploitation.

Woolly mammoths, sabre-toothed cats, giant ground sloths, and other megafauna vanished as humans spread across continents, though whether hunting or climate change was the primary driver remains fiercely debated.

Often overlooked, this mid-Permian event devastated tropical marine communities with an estimated 35 to 47 percent species loss, likely triggered by the Emeishan volcanic eruptions in present-day China.

When cyanobacteria began producing oxygen, they poisoned the anaerobic organisms that dominated early Earth, causing perhaps the largest proportional extinction ever in what scientists call the "Oxygen Catastrophe."

Dramatic global cooling transformed lush forests into open grasslands, driving mass extinctions of tropical marine and terrestrial species while giving rise to the modern fauna of horses, dogs, and grasses.