Is Greta Thunberg Still a Vegan and Why It Matters

January 10, 2026 •

3 min read

Greta Thunberg became a vegan around the age of ten, after learning about the severe environmental impact of animal agriculture. Her choice is not merely personal but a public demonstration of her core message. As of 2025, she remains a staunch vegan, frequently emphasizing the link between dietary choices and the climate crisis.

Quick Summary

Greta Thunberg maintains a dedicated vegan lifestyle, which she views as a powerful form of climate action. Her commitment stems from the environmental and ethical consequences of animal agriculture, a position she has held since childhood.

Key Points

Confirmed Vegan: Greta Thunberg is still a committed vegan as of late 2025, a practice she adopted as a young child.
Environmental Motivation: Her diet is primarily motivated by the significant environmental impact of animal agriculture, including greenhouse gas emissions and land use.
Consistent Advocacy: She frequently uses her platform to promote a plant-based diet as a powerful individual action for the climate.
Personal Influence: Thunberg successfully convinced her family to switch to a plant-based diet by presenting them with the facts on climate change.
Lifestyle Alignment: Her veganism is one part of a larger low-carbon lifestyle, alongside her famous refusal to travel by air.
Broader Message: While demonstrating personal responsibility, her overarching message targets systemic change by world leaders and industries.

Yes, Greta Thunberg Remains a Committed Vegan

In the face of constant public scrutiny, the globally recognized climate activist Greta Thunberg has remained consistently committed to her vegan diet. A lifestyle she adopted as a child, her veganism is deeply intertwined with her environmental advocacy, demonstrating her belief that personal choices and systemic change are both necessary to combat the climate crisis. Reporting from as recent as mid-2025 confirms she is still vocally plant-based.

The Environmental Philosophy Behind Thunberg's Diet

Thunberg's veganism is not a fleeting trend but a core principle of her activism. Her reasoning is backed by scientific consensus regarding the environmental toll of animal agriculture. Key reasons include:

High Emissions: Animal agriculture contributes significantly to global greenhouse gas emissions. Thunberg has pointed out that emissions from agriculture are a major component of the climate crisis, emphasizing that a shift towards a plant-based diet could dramatically lower CO2 output.
Land Use: The amount of land required for livestock grazing and feed crops is enormous. A move to a plant-based food system would require less land, allowing for reforestation and biodiversity recovery.
Water Consumption: Animal farming is incredibly water-intensive. A vegan diet significantly reduces an individual's water footprint.
Ecological Health: She connects the ecological crisis to farming methods, noting that they contribute to habitat destruction, which threatens wild plants and animals.

The Role of Personal Action

While her primary message focuses on holding leaders accountable, Thunberg also highlights the role of individual action. For her, adopting a vegan diet was a logical and impactful step that aligned her personal life with her public message. She famously challenged her own family to reduce their carbon footprint, eventually persuading her parents to go vegan or mostly vegan. Her family's story was chronicled in the book Our House Is on Fire.

Comparing the Environmental Impact: Vegan vs. Non-Vegan Diet

To illustrate her point, consider the contrast in environmental costs between vegan and animal-based diets. The data consistently shows a significant difference in resource consumption.


Environmental Factor	Vegan Diet	Animal-Based Diet (e.g., Beef)	Source of Difference
Greenhouse Gas Emissions	Dramatically lower	Significantly higher	Methane from livestock, transportation, and land use change.
Land Use	Requires less land for food production	Requires far more land for grazing and feed crops.
Water Footprint	Lower water consumption per calorie	Higher water consumption per calorie (e.g., 5x more for beef vs. wheat).
Biodiversity Impact	Lower impact, promotes reforestation	Higher impact, contributing to deforestation and habitat loss.

Beyond the Diet: A Lifestyle of Climate Action

Thunberg's veganism is part of a larger, carefully curated, low-carbon lifestyle that includes her famous refusal to fly in airplanes. This consistency demonstrates a commitment that few public figures match. For her, living by her values is not a choice but a necessity in a climate emergency. This was on full display in recent years, including her critique of Denmark's animal agriculture industry in September 2024, where she called for a stronger emissions tax and a reduction in intensive farming. Her ongoing actions and recent social media activity confirm her consistent dedication to the principles that guide her.

The Importance of Consistency

Greta Thunberg's unwavering stance on her diet strengthens her message. By embodying the changes she advocates for, she forces a deeper consideration of the link between personal habits and the global climate. While her public focus remains on holding world leaders accountable, her personal commitment serves as a powerful example of what is possible. Her actions show that ethical consumption is a valid form of protest and advocacy, proving that consistency under pressure is possible. As she once said, her activism isn't about being perfect but about starting to act, and her veganism is a testament to that belief. For more details on her biography, including her early activism, you can consult her profile on Britannica.com.

Conclusion

In summary, reports from 2025 and her consistent public messaging confirm that Greta Thunberg is still a vegan. Her plant-based diet is a deliberate, reasoned choice based on a solid understanding of climate science and the environmental consequences of animal agriculture. As a key component of her broader low-carbon lifestyle, her veganism serves as both a personal conviction and a powerful tool in her ongoing fight against climate inaction. For Thunberg, the plate is an extension of the political platform, and she continues to use both to challenge the status quo and demand a more sustainable future.

Frequently Asked Questions

Yes, Greta Thunberg is still a vegan. Her social media activity and recent reports confirm her ongoing commitment to a plant-based diet.

She is vegan primarily because of the major environmental footprint of animal agriculture, including high greenhouse gas emissions, extensive land use, and high water consumption.

Yes, Greta Thunberg successfully persuaded her parents to adopt a plant-based lifestyle after she became vegan herself. Her father is fully vegan, and her mother is reportedly about 90% vegan.

While not a topic she frequently discusses, some sources suggest that carrots are among her favorite foods. Her food choices are primarily driven by her environmental and ethical commitments.

Thunberg has been critical of the animal agriculture industry, labeling it 'catastrophic' due to its environmental impact. She calls for a transformation of the industry and supports policies like emission taxes on meat producers.

For Greta Thunberg, being vegan is a tangible way to live her values and reduce her personal carbon footprint. She promotes it as a powerful, accessible form of climate action that aligns individual choices with the larger goal of combating climate change.

While her veganism is generally well-known, her methods for persuading her family have attracted some criticism. However, her core position on the link between diet and climate is backed by scientific consensus.