Deadliest Wars in History

Name the wars that have caused more than half a million military and civilian deaths throughout history.

Data is often inaccurate or dubious, especially for pre-modern wars

Periods of conflict without a continuous or centralized war effort are grayed out

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Last updated: August 30, 2024

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First submitted	May 13, 2019
Times taken	1,296
Average score	32.7%
Rating	4.25
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Deaths	War	Years	Region
1,500,000	Chinese Warring States	475-146 B.C.	China
770,000	Second Punic War	218-201 B.C.	Mediterranean
3,000,000	Yellow Turban Rebellion	91-30 B.C.	China
1,000,000	Gallic Wars	58-50 B.C.	France
580,000	Bar Kokhba Revolt	132-136	Levant
36,000,000	Three Kingdoms War	184-280	China
2,000,000	Arab-Byzantine Wars	629-1050	Middle East
7,000,000	Reconquista	711-1492	Iberia
13,000,000	An Lushan Rebellion	755-763	China
30,000,000	Mongol Conquests	1206-1294	Eurasia
600,000	Song–Đại Việt War	1075-1077	Indochina
1,000,000	Crusades	1095-1291	Middle East
8,000,000	Conquests of Timur	1370-1405	Central Asia
2,300,000	Hundred Years War	1337-1453	France
5,200,000	Spanish Conquest of New Granada	1499-1540	South America
1,400,000	Spanish Conquest of Yucatan	1519-1595	Mexico
10,500,000	Spanish Conquest of Mexico	1519-1530	Mexico
575,000	Spanish Conquest of Nicaragua	1522-1536	Nicaragua
10,000,000	Conquest of the Inca	1533-1572	South America
2,000,000	French Wars of Religion	1562-1629	France
1,000,000	Japanese Invasion of Korea	1592-1598	Korea
600,000	Eighty Years War	1568-1648	Lowlands
25,000,000	Ming-Qing Transition	1616-1683	China
4,000,000	Thirty Years War	1618-1648	Central Europe
876,000	British Civil Wars	1639-1651	British Isles
5,000,000	Mughal-Maratha Wars	1658-1707	South Asia
680,000	Nine Years War	1688-1697	Western Europe
868,000	Seven Years War	1756-1763	Global
1,200,000	Tây Sơn Rebellion	1771-1802	Indochina
3,500,000	Napoleonic Wars	1803-1815	Europe
1,000,000	Mfecane	1810s-1840s	Southern Africa
596,000	French Conquest of Algeria	1830-1903	North Africa
20,000,000	Taiping Rebellion	1850-1864	China
4,900,000	Miao Rebellion	1854-1873	China
500,000	Punti-Hakka Clan Wars	1855-1868	China
890,000	Panthay Rebellion	1856-1873	China
800,000	Sepoy Rebellion	1857-1858	India
650,000	American Civil War	1861-1865	United States
8,000,000	Dungan Revolt	1862-1877	China
1,000,000	Mexican Revolution	1910-1920	Mexico
17,000,000	World War I	1914-1918	Global
7,000,000	Russian Civil War	1917-1922	Eastern Europe
8,000,000	Chinese Civil War	1927-1949	China
80,000,000	World War II	1937-1945	Global
500,000	Spanish Civil War	1936-1939	Iberia
1,500,000	Korean War	1950-1953	Korea
1,300,000	Vietnam War	1955-1975	Indochina
500,000	First Sudanese Civil War	1955-1972	North Africa
1,000,000	Nigerian Civil War	1967-1970	West Africa
500,000	Ethiopian Civil War	1975-1991	East Africa
504,000	Angolan Civil War	1975-2002	Southern Africa
1,400,000	Afghanistan War	1978-present	Central Asia
1,000,000	Second Sudanese Civil War	1983-2005	North Africa
500,000	Rwandan Civil War	1990-1994	East Africa
2,500,000	Second Congo War	1998-2003	Africa
580,000	Syrian Civil War	2011-present	Middle East
500,000	Russo-Ukrainian War	2022-present	Eastern Europe

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8 Comments

Level 75

Aug 30, 2024

Thanks to TheLetter4 for spending 4 hours helping me fact check the answers for this update!

Some notes:

Some wars on the list were excluded entirely because they were general periods rather than actual wars or because they were part of wars that were already on the list.

For most answers we tried including the region most specific to the conflict. However, for some civil wars we used broader categorizations so as not to give away the answers.

The wars involved in the British Civil Wars are sometimes referred to as the Wars of the Three Kingdoms (Scotland, Ireland, England), so we had to include it as a typein despite another conflict also using that name.

Level 75

Aug 30, 2024

Spanish conquests were included when they were against a centralized state, but we grayed them out for conquests of more general regions of dispersed tribes, especially since most of these deaths came from the unintentional spread of disease.

There’s a fine line in the inclusion of some of these, but we decided to include some conflicts that were non-continuous or lacking in a defined goal based on their recognition and utility in the context of a quiz.

Level 68

Dec 18, 2023

Accept Tamerlane/Conquests of Tamerlane for Conquests of Timur?

Level 85

Sep 5, 2024

"English Civil War" doesn't work and "British Civil WarS" is required? C'mon man.

Level 75

Sep 5, 2024

English Civil War and British Civil War both work for me

Level 69

Sep 5, 2024

Just the name of the country involved in the war should be accepted

Level 75

Sep 5, 2024

Level 65

Sep 6, 2024

Could you sort the wars by the amount of deaths instead of the date?

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