This article is a list of biological species, subspecies, and evolutionary significant units that are known to have become extinct during the Holocene, the current geologic epoch, ordered by their known or approximate date of disappearance from oldest to most recent.
The Holocene is considered to have started with the Holocene glacial retreat around 11650 years Before Present (c. 9700 BC). It is characterized by a general trend towards global warming, the expansion of anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens) to all emerged land masses, the appearance of agriculture and animal husbandry, and a reduction in global biodiversity. The latter, dubbed the sixth mass extinction in Earth history, is largely attributed to increased human population and activity, and may have started already during the preceding Pleistocene epoch with the demise of the Pleistocene megafauna.
The following list is incomplete by necessity, since the majority of extinctions are thought to be undocumented, and for many others there isn't a definitive, widely accepted last, or most recent record. According to the species-area theory, the present rate of extinction may be up to 140,000 species per year.[1]