By J. Mark Welch
The world wheat situation for the 2025 crop was dominated by overall favorable growing conditions. According to the December 2025 USDA World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE), world wheat production continued a long-term increasing trend, reaching a record of 837.81 million metric tons, about 31 billion bushels. In the U.S., the average wheat yield for the 2025 crop also continued a long-term increasing trend to a record high 53.3 bushels per acre, beating the old record of 52.7 bushels in 2016.
With record production and yield, what do supply and demand fundamentals in the wheat market portend for price expectations in 2026?
For the U.S., wheat planted area has levelled off over the last few years to around 45 million acres. Last winter was under the influence of an El Niño weather pattern, generally associated with cooler temperatures and above normal precipitation in the Southern Plains (2016 was an El Niño year, too). The forecast for the winter of 2026 is for La Niña conditions to be present. La Niña winters are generally warmer and drier than normal. That is not a favorable forecast for above normal yields. With little change in acreage, the U.S. wheat crop in 2026 is likely to be smaller than 2025.
U.S. wheat domestic use is little changed over the last 20 years (Figure 1). Food use is right around 950 million bushels per year, varying no more than 59 million bushels since 2005/2006. Wheat for feed averages about 135 million bushels per year. The high in feed use (360 million bushels) came in 2012 with the major drought in the Corn Belt.
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