The National UFO Reporting Center has received more than 2,000 incidents of UFO sightings in the first half of 2025, The Hill reported Friday.
Since January, the nonprofit, known as NUFORC, has received 2,174 reports of UFOs and unexplained sightings in 2025, an increase from the 1,492 over the same period in 2024.
The center, which has collected and investigated cases since 1974, noted that of the 3,000 reports collected this year, many of the sightings happened years or decades ago and are not immediately reported due to the stigma involving UFO cases.
Christian Stepien, NUFORC’s chief technology officer, said he believes that only 5% of sightings are ever reported. Over the years, the center has received information from air traffic controllers, military personnel, police, and everyday citizens.
“There are so many things being seen by so many people. And if it’s a secret block project, you’re not flying it over highly populated neighborhoods where everybody can see it, and even these days, have pictures of it,” Stepien told the outlet.
Many of the cases NUFORC received end up being easily explained as balloons, drones, planets, and stars.
“We get lots of reports of balloons and things like that that we can say that’s clearly a balloon, or that’s a drone, or it’s an airplane or whatever it is,” he said. Roughly 3% of the reports turn out to be worth pursuing.
“The dramatic ones are kind of the cases where you say somebody saw a giant triangle floating over their house the size of a tennis court or a football field,” Stepien said. “And we get those reports fairly regularly, things that can’t possibly be mistaken for something else.”
The report from NUFORC comes as the Trump administration seeks to be more transparent about UFOs. The White House announced in June an order to “restore American airspace sovereignty.”
The task force recognizes the growing threat of unmanned aircraft systems and seeks to increase restrictions over critical infrastructure and develop new drone detection technologies. Stepien hopes the new attitude toward UFOs from the government will strengthen these efforts.
“The government certainly has the good stuff,” he added. “These days with cellphones and things like that, we’re starting to get some nice videos and things, but we don’t have high-resolution cameras and forward-looking infrared [technology] and that kind of stuff.”
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