Market statistics
How volatile each year actually was, 1928 to today
A year's return says what happened; the number of days it moved more than 1% says what it felt like. The two are barely related — 2017 and 2021 both finished up around 20%, and only one of them was quiet.
98 complete years · data through 28 Aug 2026
1928–2025
- Average 1% days
- 61
- per year, whole record
- Average volatility
- 16.6%
- annualised, realised
- Noisiest year
- 1932
- 53.4% · 181 1% days
- Calmest year
- 1964
- 5.3% · 3 1% days
- Most recent (2025)
- 55 days
- 18.7% annualised
| Year | Volatility | 1% days | 2% days | 3% days | Best day | Worst day |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 18.7% | 55 | 13 | 5 | +9.51% 04-09 | -5.97% 04-04 |
| 2024 | 12.6% | 50 | 7 | 0 | +2.53% 11-06 | -3.00% 08-05 |
| 2023 | 13.1% | 64 | 2 | 0 | +2.28% 01-06 | -2.00% 02-21 |
| 2022 | 24.1% | 122 | 46 | 12 | +5.54% 11-10 | -4.32% 09-13 |
| 2021 | 13.1% | 55 | 7 | 0 | +2.38% 03-01 | -2.57% 01-27 |
| 2020 | 34.4% | 109 | 44 | 28 | +9.38% 03-24 | -11.98% 03-16 |
| 2019 | 12.5% | 37 | 7 | 1 | +3.43% 01-04 | -2.98% 08-05 |
| 2018 | 17.0% | 64 | 20 | 6 | +4.96% 12-26 | -4.10% 02-05 |
| 2017 | 6.7% | 8 | 0 | 0 | +1.37% 03-01 | -1.82% 05-17 |
| 2016 | 13.1% | 48 | 9 | 1 | +2.48% 01-29 | -3.59% 06-24 |
| 2015 | 15.5% | 72 | 10 | 3 | +3.90% 08-26 | -3.94% 08-24 |
| 2014 | 11.4% | 38 | 6 | 0 | +2.40% 12-18 | -2.28% 02-03 |
| 2013 | 11.1% | 38 | 4 | 0 | +2.54% 01-02 | -2.50% 06-20 |
| 2012 | 12.7% | 50 | 6 | 0 | +2.49% 06-29 | -2.46% 06-01 |
| 2011 | 23.2% | 96 | 35 | 12 | +4.74% 08-09 | -6.66% 08-08 |
| 2010 | 18.0% | 76 | 22 | 8 | +4.40% 05-10 | -3.90% 05-20 |
| 2009 | 27.2% | 117 | 55 | 23 | +7.08% 03-23 | -5.28% 01-20 |
| 2008 | 40.9% | 134 | 72 | 42 | +11.58% 10-13 | -9.03% 10-15 |
| 2007 | 16.0% | 65 | 17 | 1 | +2.92% 09-18 | -3.47% 02-27 |
| 2006 | 10.0% | 29 | 2 | 0 | +2.16% 06-29 | -1.83% 01-20 |
| 2005 | 10.3% | 30 | 0 | 0 | +1.97% 04-21 | -1.67% 04-15 |
| 2004 | 11.1% | 41 | 0 | 0 | +1.64% 03-25 | -1.63% 08-05 |
| 2003 | 17.0% | 82 | 15 | 4 | +3.54% 03-17 | -3.52% 03-24 |
| 2002 | 26.0% | 125 | 52 | 17 | +5.73% 07-24 | -4.15% 09-03 |
| 2001 | 21.5% | 105 | 25 | 8 | +5.01% 01-03 | -4.92% 09-17 |
| 2000 | 22.2% | 102 | 37 | 11 | +4.76% 03-16 | -5.83% 04-14 |
| 1999 | 18.0% | 92 | 23 | 1 | +3.53% 10-28 | -2.81% 10-15 |
| 1998 | 20.3% | 79 | 23 | 9 | +5.09% 09-08 | -6.80% 08-31 |
| 1997 | 18.1% | 81 | 15 | 3 | +5.12% 10-28 | -6.87% 10-27 |
| 1996 | 11.8% | 38 | 3 | 1 | +1.94% 12-19 | -3.08% 03-08 |
| 1995 | 7.8% | 13 | 0 | 0 | +1.88% 05-31 | -1.55% 12-18 |
| 1994 | 9.8% | 27 | 2 | 0 | +2.13% 04-05 | -2.27% 02-04 |
| 1993 | 8.6% | 17 | 1 | 0 | +1.93% 03-08 | -2.40% 02-16 |
| 1992 | 9.7% | 28 | 0 | 0 | +1.56% 04-09 | -1.86% 04-07 |
| 1991 | 14.3% | 59 | 9 | 2 | +3.73% 01-17 | -3.66% 11-15 |
| 1990 | 15.9% | 75 | 13 | 2 | +3.19% 08-27 | -3.02% 08-06 |
| 1989 | 13.0% | 40 | 4 | 1 | +2.76% 10-16 | -6.12% 10-13 |
| 1988 | 17.1% | 68 | 16 | 4 | +3.59% 01-04 | -6.77% 01-08 |
| 1987 | 32.1% | 95 | 40 | 9 | +9.10% 10-21 | -20.47% 10-19 |
| 1986 | 14.7% | 60 | 9 | 2 | +2.26% 03-11 | -4.81% 09-11 |
| 1985 | 10.1% | 28 | 1 | 0 | +2.28% 01-21 | -1.46% 07-29 |
| 1984 | 12.7% | 41 | 7 | 0 | +2.76% 08-03 | -1.82% 02-08 |
| 1983 | 13.3% | 55 | 4 | 0 | +2.71% 07-20 | -2.70% 01-24 |
| 1982 | 18.2% | 82 | 17 | 6 | +4.76% 08-17 | -3.97% 10-25 |
| 1981 | 13.4% | 54 | 7 | 0 | +2.49% 03-12 | -2.89% 08-24 |
| 1980 | 16.4% | 80 | 11 | 2 | +3.64% 04-22 | -3.01% 03-17 |
| 1979 | 10.8% | 30 | 3 | 0 | +2.06% 09-20 | -2.96% 10-09 |
| 1978 | 12.6% | 43 | 4 | 1 | +3.97% 11-01 | -2.01% 10-31 |
| 1977 | 9.1% | 17 | 0 | 0 | +1.86% 11-10 | -1.63% 07-27 |
| 1976 | 11.1% | 39 | 0 | 0 | +1.85% 01-05 | -1.80% 05-24 |
| 1975 | 15.4% | 80 | 11 | 1 | +3.27% 01-27 | -2.36% 03-24 |
| 1974 | 21.8% | 114 | 32 | 9 | +4.60% 10-09 | -3.67% 11-18 |
| 1973 | 15.8% | 78 | 15 | 2 | +3.06% 12-26 | -3.05% 11-19 |
| 1972 | 7.9% | 10 | 0 | 0 | +1.42% 09-27 | -1.32% 05-09 |
| 1971 | 10.2% | 32 | 1 | 1 | +3.21% 08-16 | -1.52% 06-18 |
| 1970 | 15.1% | 65 | 11 | 1 | +5.02% 05-27 | -2.77% 05-25 |
| 1969 | 10.0% | 25 | 2 | 0 | +2.11% 07-31 | -2.01% 07-28 |
| 1968 | 9.4% | 21 | 1 | 0 | +2.53% 04-01 | -1.90% 03-14 |
| 1967 | 8.4% | 19 | 1 | 0 | +2.04% 06-06 | -1.57% 10-31 |
| 1966 | 11.8% | 41 | 5 | 0 | +2.84% 10-12 | -2.46% 08-29 |
| 1965 | 6.9% | 9 | 1 | 0 | +2.07% 06-30 | -1.84% 06-02 |
| 1964 | 5.3% | 3 | 0 | 0 | +0.89% 05-01 | -1.25% 08-04 |
| 1963 | 8.6% | 7 | 2 | 1 | +3.98% 11-26 | -2.81% 11-22 |
| 1962 | 16.5% | 57 | 13 | 5 | +4.65% 05-29 | -6.68% 05-28 |
| 1961 | 10.1% | 21 | 3 | 2 | +3.48% 04-17 | -3.61% 04-18 |
| 1960 | 10.4% | 30 | 2 | 0 | +2.06% 04-06 | -2.27% 09-19 |
| 1959 | 9.4% | 25 | 2 | 0 | +2.21% 02-19 | -2.09% 08-10 |
| 1958 | 9.0% | 19 | 0 | 0 | +1.72% 11-26 | -1.94% 11-25 |
| 1957 | 13.0% | 41 | 8 | 1 | +4.49% 10-23 | -2.93% 10-21 |
| 1956 | 12.4% | 48 | 5 | 0 | +2.43% 09-14 | -2.04% 09-13 |
| 1955 | 15.3% | 45 | 12 | 3 | +3.57% 07-06 | -6.62% 09-25 |
| 1954 | 9.4% | 17 | 3 | 0 | +2.83% 12-17 | -2.24% 06-08 |
| 1953 | 9.6% | 23 | 2 | 1 | +1.40% 09-22 | -3.09% 02-09 |
| 1952 | 7.9% | 13 | 0 | 0 | +1.68% 05-02 | -1.72% 10-15 |
| 1951 | 10.8% | 36 | 1 | 0 | +1.93% 07-05 | -2.44% 10-22 |
| 1950 | 14.9% | 55 | 9 | 4 | +2.69% 12-18 | -5.38% 06-26 |
| 1949 | 11.7% | 34 | 6 | 1 | +2.24% 01-06 | -3.04% 01-24 |
| 1948 | 15.2% | 54 | 10 | 5 | +2.65% 03-22 | -4.61% 11-03 |
| 1947 | 14.2% | 62 | 7 | 2 | +2.56% 04-21 | -3.94% 04-14 |
| 1946 | 22.8% | 77 | 29 | 16 | +4.22% 12-09 | -9.91% 09-03 |
| 1945 | 12.8% | 48 | 9 | 0 | +2.53% 12-26 | -2.55% 03-26 |
| 1944 | 9.1% | 16 | 2 | 0 | +2.28% 06-12 | -2.43% 09-06 |
| 1943 | 13.2% | 42 | 7 | 3 | +2.18% 08-03 | -3.97% 04-09 |
| 1942 | 13.6% | 59 | 8 | 0 | +2.47% 07-08 | -2.63% 03-06 |
| 1941 | 15.0% | 54 | 11 | 4 | +4.42% 12-30 | -3.76% 12-08 |
| 1940 | 21.9% | 71 | 20 | 11 | +5.56% 11-07 | -7.47% 05-14 |
| 1939 | 25.9% | 104 | 41 | 11 | +11.86% 09-05 | -6.43% 01-23 |
| 1938 | 34.5% | 146 | 74 | 37 | +8.25% 10-10 | -7.69% 10-11 |
| 1937 | 29.5% | 117 | 53 | 24 | +7.48% 10-20 | -9.12% 10-18 |
| 1936 | 19.3% | 89 | 21 | 7 | +5.80% 09-17 | -5.84% 09-16 |
| 1935 | 28.4% | 98 | 32 | 11 | +9.61% 04-17 | -9.97% 04-16 |
| 1934 | 26.2% | 123 | 55 | 14 | +5.66% 01-15 | -7.83% 07-26 |
| 1933 | 48.7% | 162 | 94 | 61 | +16.61% 03-15 | -8.88% 07-20 |
| 1932 | 53.4% | 181 | 133 | 96 | +11.81% 09-21 | -8.55% 10-10 |
| 1931 | 41.5% | 168 | 92 | 49 | +12.36% 10-06 | -9.07% 10-05 |
| 1930 | 27.8% | 128 | 52 | 24 | +5.05% 04-01 | -7.64% 06-16 |
| 1929 | 37.2% | 114 | 47 | 29 | +12.53% 10-30 | -12.94% 10-28 |
| 1928 | 14.8% | 66 | 6 | 2 | +3.00% 06-13 | -3.78% 12-06 |
Price returns from daily closing levels. Index price returns exclude dividends. Full provenance, method and a citation line are in Sources and method below.
Volatility in a unit you can feel
The long-run average is 61 sessions a year moving more than 1% in one direction or the other, and an annualised volatility of about 17%. Those two numbers are the baseline everything else on this page should be read against. A year with ninety 1% days was roughly twice as eventful as normal; a year with twenty-five was half.
The best-day and worst-day columns are the most revealing part of the table, and not for the reason you would expect. In 34 of these 98 years, the largest gain and the largest loss fell in the same calendar month. Violent up days are not the opposite of violent down days — they are the same market condition, and they arrive together. That is the same fact the best-days page measures from the other direction.
Annualised volatility here is realised: computed after the fact from what the index actually did. It is not the VIX, which is derived from option prices and describes what the market expects over the next month. The two are related and routinely confused, and the VIX generally sits above realised volatility because it carries a risk premium as well as a forecast.
The relationship between volatility and returns is weaker than intuition suggests. The very worst years are almost all noisy, but so are several of the best, because a sharp recovery is volatility too. A year being busy tells you something about the experience of holding the index and remarkably little about where it finished — which is the argument for reading this table beside the annual returns rather than instead of them.
Questions people ask about this
- What counts as a volatile year?
- There is no threshold on this page, deliberately. The long-run average is about fifty sessions a year moving more than 1%, so a year with ninety is roughly twice as eventful as normal and a year with twenty-five is half. The table lets you place any year against the whole record rather than against a label someone else chose.
- How is annualised volatility calculated?
- Standard deviation of that year's daily percentage changes, multiplied by the square root of 252 — the conventional count of US trading days in a year. It is realised volatility, computed after the fact from what the index did. It is not the VIX, which is a forward-looking figure derived from option prices and generally sits higher.
- Does high volatility mean a bad year?
- Not reliably. The correlation runs the way you would expect at the extremes — the worst years are almost all noisy — but plenty of strongly positive years were also busy, because a violent rebound is volatility too. The best-day and worst-day columns make this obvious: they frequently belong to the same year, and often to the same month.
Sources and method
- Data
- Financial Modeling Prep — Daily adjusted closing levels and quotes, retrieved through Plutux's own data service.
- S&P Dow Jones Indices — Publisher and methodology owner of the S&P 500 index itself.
- How it was calculated
- Daily percentage changes between consecutive closes, bucketed by calendar year. Annualised volatility is the standard deviation of that year's daily changes times the square root of 252. Move counts use the absolute change, so a 1% day is a move of at least 1% in either direction. Full years only. Price returns, dividends excluded.
- How often it changes
- Regenerated from the full daily history about once a year; the date it runs through is at the top of the page.
- Citing this page
Free to quote — please link rather than copy the table.
Plutux. "How volatile each year actually was, 1928 to today." Data through 28 Aug 2026. https://plutux.ai/resources/tools/stock-market-volatility-by-year
Historical figures for information only — not investment advice, and not a forecast.
Related tools
- Missing the best daysThe most-quoted statistic in retail investing, computed from the actual daily record, with the half that never gets quoted next to it.
- After a big moveForward returns after every big session since 1928, each one against the unconditional odds over the same horizon.
- Red days in green yearsFor every year since 1928: how many sessions closed below where the year started, how often it crossed that line, and how deep it got.
Plutux is not an investment adviser. Market data and AI-generated analysis are for information and education only, not investment advice. Disclaimer