World mine output was about 3.9 Mt in 2025, and Indonesia produced about 2.6 Mt of it (about two-thirds), up from a small share a decade earlier. The Philippines, Russia, New Caledonia, Canada and China follow. Reserves are about 140 Mt, with Indonesia and Australia largest. IEA puts the top three refining countries at about 80%.
IEA demand was about 3.5 Mt in 2025, reaching about 4.5 Mt in 2030 and 5.8 Mt in 2040 in Stated Policies. Stainless steel still takes most nickel; batteries are the growth segment.
Critical for the EU (strategic, battery grade), US, UK, Canada, Australia, India, Korea and China. Indonesia's 2020 ore export ban moved processing onshore and is the main policy force in the market.
From the USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries
US production and use
In 2025, the underground Eagle Mine in Michigan produced approximately 10,000 tons of nickel in concentrate, which was exported to smelters in Canada and overseas. In the United States, the leading uses for primary nickel were alloys and steels, electroplating, and other uses including catalysts and chemicals. Stainless and alloy steel and nickel-containing alloys typically account for more than 85% of domestic consumption.
Events, trends and issues
Prices continued their downward trend from 2022 highs. In 2025, the annual average LME nickel cash price was estimated to have decreased by 11% compared with that in 2024. According to the International Nickel Study Group, the global primary nickel market balance (the difference between production and consumption) has been in a state of surplus since 2022. The surplus was estimated to be 98,500 tons in 2022, 170,000 tons in 2023, and 182,000 tons in 2024. Through the first 9 months of 2025, the estimated surplus was 189,000 tons, compared with 107,000 tons during the same period in 2024. Nickel-bearing mine projects were under consideration or development in Alaska, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, and Oregon. In Minnesota, a company continued to progress a feasibility study for the Tamarack nickel-copper-cobalt project. In 2025, the Nikolai and NorthMet projects, located in Alaska and Minnesota, respectively, were designated as Federal Transparency Projects under the Fixing America’s Surface Transport Act and added to the permitting dashboard. Three companies were considering or developing nickel refinery projects in Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas. In Oklahoma, a company built a pilot-scale nickel refining facility. The last U.S. primary nickel refinery, the Port Nickel facility in Louisiana, ceased operations in 1985. Small amounts of nickel continued to be recovered domestically as a byproduct of copper and platinum-group-metals processing and from recycled materials. Executive Order 14285, issued in April, called for the development of seabed mineral deposits to help secure supplies of critical minerals such as nickel. Following the order, several companies submitted applications to explore regions prospective for nickel-bearing ferromanganese crusts and polymetallic nodules. A 2022 U.S. Geological Survey study estimated that global seabed deposits contain approximately 4.5 billion tons of nickel.7 Estimated global nickel mine production increased by 5% to an estimated 3.9 million tons in 2025. Production in Indonesia increased by an estimated 13% as new operations continued to ramp up production. Canadian production increased after a company completed a mine expansion. In New Caledonia, production increased as a result of more consistent operating conditions after the interruptions in 2024. Production in Australia decreased by an estimated 54% after multiple companies placed mines into care-and-maintenance status owing to low prices. In the Philippines, production declined by an estimated 24% after multiple mines reported production cuts. In the Philippine Province of Palawan, a 50-year ban on new mining permits was announced. The ban did not affect existing operations.
Substitutes
Low-nickel, duplex, or ultrahigh-chromium stainless steels have been substituted for austenitic grades in construction. Nickel-free specialty steels are sometimes used in place of stainless steel in the power-generating and petrochemical industries. Titanium alloys can substitute for nickel or nickel-base alloys in corrosive environments.
Recycling
Most secondary nickel was in the form of nickel content of stainless-steel scrap. Nickel in alloyed form was recovered from the processing of nickel-containing waste. Most recycled nickel was used to produce new alloys and stainless steel. In 2025, nickel recovered from scrap accounted for approximately 60% of apparent consumption.
World resources
Globally, nickel resources have been estimated to contain more than 350 million tons of nickel, with 54% in laterites and 35% in magmatic sulfide deposits. Hydrothermal systems such as iron-nickel alloy, sedimentary-hosted polymetallic, and volcanogenic massive sulfide deposits, as well as seafloor manganese crusts and nodules contain 10%, and miscellaneous resources such as tailings, 1%.
