China's Military Build-Up in Numbers
China has the world's largest navy by ship count, about 620 nuclear warheads and the second-largest military budget. Where its build-up stands in 2026.
No military has changed as much over the past quarter-century as China’s People’s Liberation Army. In the late 1990s it was a huge but poorly equipped force built mainly for defending its own territory. Today it fields the largest navy in the world by number of ships, one of the largest air forces, and a nuclear arsenal that is growing faster than anyone else’s.
Money
SIPRI estimates China spent $336 billion on its military in 2025, up 7.4% in real terms. That is second only to the United States, and China’s spending has risen every year for three decades. As a share of its economy, it remains modest at about 1.7% of GDP, which means it can keep growing without straining the country’s finances the way Russia’s or Israel’s spending does.
The navy
China’s fleet is the largest in our dataset, with 841 vessels by Global Firepower’s count, against 747 for Russia and 465 for the United States. Many are small coastal ships, but its core of large combatants has grown rapidly:
- 3 aircraft carriers, including the Fujian, its first carrier with electromagnetic catapults, commissioned in November 2025
- 53 destroyers, second only to the US Navy’s 83
- 46 frigates and 50 corvettes
- 61 submarines, close to the US and Russian totals
| # | Country | Total fleet |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 🇨🇳 China | 841 |
| 2 | 🇷🇺 Russia | 747 |
| 3 | 🇺🇸 United States | 465 |
| 4 | 🇮🇳 India | 343 |
| 5 | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | 338 |
| 6 | 🇰🇵 North Korea | 332 |
| 7 | 🇮🇹 Italy | 285 |
| 8 | 🇰🇷 South Korea | 215 |
China also has by far the world’s largest shipbuilding industry, which means it can build new warships much faster than the US or Europe. That industrial gap worries Western naval planners as much as the current fleet numbers. Read more in the world’s largest navies.
Air and missile forces
China’s air force and navy fly about 3,529 military aircraft, including 1,443 fighters, the second-largest fighter fleet after the United States. It has also built the world’s largest force of land-based conventional missiles, intended to threaten ships, airbases and ports across the western Pacific.
Nuclear weapons
China’s nuclear stockpile is the biggest change of all. SIPRI estimates it at about 620 warheads in January 2026, up from about 350 in January 2021, and it continues to grow. China has built hundreds of new missile silos in its northern deserts and is expanding its fleet of missile submarines. It remains far smaller than the US and Russian arsenals, but the trend is clear. See which countries have nuclear weapons.
People
China still has the largest active military in the world at about 2.04 million personnel, although that is smaller than it was. Over the past two decades it has cut ground forces and shifted resources to the navy, air force and missile forces. The emphasis has moved from mass to technology.
What it is for
Most of China’s build-up is focused on its immediate region: Taiwan, the South and East China Seas, and keeping American forces at a distance. Compare China directly with Taiwan, Japan and the United States.