People around the world toasted the end of 2025 with hopes for a better year.
New Year celebrations took on a sombre tone in Sydney as revellers held a minute's silence for victims of the Bondi Beach shooting before fireworks lit up the city at the stroke of midnight.
A heavy police presence was in place to monitor the thousands who watched the show, centred on the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Many officers openly carried rapid-fire rifles, a first for the event.
“Right now, the joy that we usually feel at the start of a new year is tempered by the sadness of the old,” Australia's Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in a video message released an hour before midnight.
Ras Al Khaimah welcomes 2026 with huge fireworks display 01:05
In Croatia, celebrations got off to an early start. Since 2000, the town of Fuzine has held its countdown at noon, a tradition that has since spread across the country.
Crowds cheered, toasted each other with champagne and danced to music - all in the middle of the day. Some brave souls in Santa hats took a plunge into the icy waters of Lake Bajer.
Pacific nations Kiribati and New Zealand were the first to see in 2026, with Seoul and Tokyo following Sydney as celebrations stretched to glitzy New York and the Hogmanay festival on the chilly streets of Scotland.
More than two million people packed into Rio de Janeiro's Copacabana Beach for what authorities called the world's biggest New Year's Eve party.
Indonesia and Hong Kong hold subdued events
In Indonesia, cities scaled back festivities in solidarity with communities devastated by floods and landslides that struck parts of Sumatra a month ago, claiming more than 1,100 lives.
The capital, Jakarta, held subdued celebrations with a programme centred on prayers for victims.
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