COP31 Antalya 2026 the UN climate talks

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COP stands for Conference of the Parties. The Parties are the 198 members of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the treaty agreed in 1992 to stabilise greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere: 197 countries plus the European Union. They have met every year since 1995, apart from 2020, to negotiate how that goal is put into practice. COP31 is the thirty-first of those meetings. The same fortnight also hosts the twenty-first session of the Kyoto Protocol meeting (CMP 21) and the eighth session of the Paris Agreement meeting (CMA 8), which is why the official programme lists all three.

The best-known result of the process is the Paris Agreement of 2015, under which countries aim to hold warming well below 2°C and pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5°C. Each country sets its own targets, called nationally determined contributions, and is expected to strengthen them over time. The annual COPs are where governments review progress, agree rules and negotiate the decisions that hold the system together.

A COP is two events at once. In the negotiating rooms, government delegations work through a formal agenda, alongside meetings of the bodies that serve the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement. Around them, thousands of observers, businesses, researchers, journalists and local visitors take part in exhibitions, side events and public programmes.

More than a decade after Paris, the focus of the talks has moved from writing rules to delivering on them. The host country's stated aim for COP31 is to move "from negotiation to implementation". In practice, the conference returns to several long-running questions:

Alongside the formal negotiations, the host runs an Action Agenda. Its ten published themes are zero waste, oceans and seas, food security, climate-resilient cities, the Climate Implementation Bridge, youth and education, green industrialisation, the clean energy transition, Rio synergy, and dynamic and resilient health systems. These are the host's priorities for events and initiatives, not items on the negotiating agenda. The decisions themselves are negotiated and agreed by the Parties during the conference; none of them is settled in advance.

The decision on who would host COP31 was taken at COP30 in Belém, Brazil, in November 2025. Türkiye and Australia had both bid, and the outcome was a shared arrangement: Türkiye hosts the conference in Antalya and holds the COP31 Presidency, while Australia's climate minister leads the negotiations as President of Negotiations.

Antalya is Türkiye's busiest holiday region, so it already has what a conference of this size needs: an international airport with routes across Europe and beyond, a large exhibition centre, and tens of thousands of hotel rooms. The organisers describe it as the city of blue and green, where the Mediterranean meets forested mountains. The same coast and forests that draw visitors are also exposed to heat, drought and wildfire.

For our full picture of the city and its surroundings, see the Antalya travel guide and the Antalya city guide.

Türkiye lies in the Mediterranean basin, which the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) describes as a climate change hotspot. Regional assessments by the Mediterranean Experts on Climate and Environmental Change (MedECC) find that the basin is warming faster than the global average, and it is projected to become drier. The effects differ across a country this large.

These photographs are from our own archive. They show the landscapes discussed here, not specific climate events. To see more of these places, read our guides to national parks in Türkiye and hiking in Türkiye.

The most important thing to understand is that COP31 has two separate areas with separate rules. Not everyone can enter the conference venue.

Details, opening hours and registration can change, so treat the official pages as the final word.

Show Me Türkiye is an independent publication and is not affiliated with the UNFCCC or the COP31 Presidency. For registration, accreditation, programmes and any binding information, go to the official sources:

Most people will know COP31 through headlines about negotiations and final decisions. For anyone who comes to Antalya, it is also a chance to see the landscapes the talks are about: a warm sea, pine forests that live with fire, rivers fed by mountain snow, and a coast that millions of people depend on.

We will keep this guide up to date as official details are confirmed. Until then, the safest rule is simple: check the official websites before you book, and check them again before you travel.