The AP's Best Wildlife Photos of 2025

The AP's most striking images from nature in 2025 show existence as fragile as an albino turtle hatchling among its peers or a cicada's translucent wings. Beyond the headlines and sometimes dangerous human impacts on their worlds, animals persist. A polar bear sprawls outside an abandoned research station on an island off Russia, surrounded by grass—not snow. A raccoon eats peanuts on a boardwalk in Panama City. Sheep are herded through central Madrid.

The photos show a world without us and without borders, one of extraordinary beauty in the everyday. A hummingbird is poised to sip from a flower. A pollen-flecked ladybug explores a dandelion. A humpback whale surfaces with a splash. All things end. An insect is trapped in a glistening carnivorous plant. Vultures fly over an unseen carcass in India. Eagles clash while hunting. And then, as a baby bird peeks from among its parents' feathers, life begins again. Check out the selections in our photo gallery.