Ipsos Global Trends 10th Edition

Hope is personal as we search for silver linings

It’s easy to look at what’s going on in the world and worry about the future. The 10^th edition of Ipsos Global Trends finds that people remain optimistic for ourselves, but many feel less optimistic this year than they have in the past about the world around us.

That tension between self-empowerment and collective helplessness leads to a crucial truth:

Hope is personal.

The search for silver linings starts with a harsh reality: the macro environment is becoming more volatile, complex and unpredictable. For instance, current warming trajectories mean we are increasingly likely to see a world beyond the 1.5°C threshold. The geopolitical environment is highly adversarial as old fissures deepen and new fronts open. And the world’s demographic slowdown continues as birth rates continue to fall, life stages occur later, and societies age.

Key Silver Linings

Silver linings are not the absence of problems, but the opportunities that emerge from them. Alongside the challenges, encouraging signs point towards a more positive future:

• Trust has relocated: Trust in familiar brands remains high and continues to rise. That trust is increasingly earned through proximity: 70% say they prefer to buy products from their country rather than abroad. Local communities, national identity and everyday credibility matter more than distant institutions.
• Healthcare becomes intentional: Mental and physical wellbeing are now almost equally important concerns: over eight in ten feel they need to do more to improve both. Advances in diagnostics, medicines and health technology are encouraging people to think of health as something that can be influenced and optimised, not just monitored and measured.
• Finding hope in the self: As optimism retreats from the world to the individual, people are investing more heavily in self-improvement, status, achievement and personal agency. As nearly half say they measure their success by the things they own, across many markets traditional measures of achievement are becoming more important, not less.

Key Implications for Brand and Policy Leaders

This changing macro context matters because instability at the global level creates greater volatility further down the system. As macro forces intensify, leaders can expect faster shifts in public opinion, consumer behaviour and government policy.

“The challenge is not simply to respond to today's volatility, it is to help people see a credible path through it," said Kelly Beaver, CEO of Ipsos. "The search for silver linings is ultimately a search for reasons to believe that progress remains possible. In a restless decade, that belief may be one of society's most important sources of resilience.”

Organisations, brands and governments are discovering new ways to respond to a changing world. With much of the pre-pandemic world order overturned, there is greater scope to improve things and build a new, positive future.

The Full Ipsos Global Trends Report

Methodology 2026

KEYS: Ipsos Global Trends: The Search for Silver Linings

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Now comes the interesting part. Trends are holistic narratives that help to unearth opportunities and navigate potential threats, acting as compelling conversation starters and catalysts for within your organisation. We present Ipsos Global Trends to get you thinking and give you tools to help you understand society, markets and people today – and through applied foresight– into tomorrow.

Ipsos has multiple ways to activate these insights for your team or organisation. From data access, to workshops, to adding texture and nuance with qualitative and social listening including:

Strategy:

• Activation Workshops
• Consultative trends support
• Applying our data and insights to your own trends framework

Insights:

• Executive briefings tailored to your business
• Bespoke trend reporting
• Sector level social data deep-dive

Data access:

• Access to this year’s data portal
• Access to our full historic data portal

Contact: [email protected] to learn more