The Dow Jones is a price-weighted index—this means the 30 companies with the highest stock prices move the Dow the most, not the biggest by market cap. The DJIA is a price-weighted stock index made up of 30 major U.S. companies. It’s one of the most-watched indicators of the stock market’s overall health.

📊 Top 5 Dow Jones Record Closes (Nov 2024 – Aug

These funds track the DJIA through a similar composition and weighting of stocks. The largest single-day drop, percentage-wise, that the Dow has had occurred when the market crashed on Oct. 19, 1987, Black Monday. Many records were set in 2019, thanks partly to trade talks with China that boosted firms in the index. The longest bull market in history lasted about 11 years, starting in March 2009 and ending in February 2020.

What Is the Highest the Dow Jones Has Ever Been? (August 2025 All-Time Highs & Records)

The highest closing value ever for the Dow is 45,631.74, set on August 22, 2025.

For long-term investors, these milestones are reminders to stay disciplined. The Dow set two milestones in 2014 and set 39 closing records. Share repurchases among the S&P 500 companies were 59% higher in the first quarter of 2014 than the first quarter in 2013. It was the largest amount since 2007, right before the stock market crashed.

The index’s 2016 closing high was 19,974.62, set on Dec. 20, 2016. It hit two of them in the first few weeks in January, closing above 25,000 on Jan. 4. The index breached 26,000 on Jan. 17, then continued on to set 15 closing records in the rest of 2018. But this robust start was not indicative of extreme volatility the index would face as the year progressed. First, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine saw gas prices spike sharply. At the same time, the strength in the U.S. labor market meant extremely competitive wages driving consumer demand.

In parentheses, when helpful, we provide the Dow’s points as inflation-adjusted to Feb. 23, 2024, for a relative comparison to its record highs. While there are always pullbacks, the Dow has set new records after every major correction for over 100 years. The Dow Jones always bounces back—even after historic crashes. Every bear market in U.S. history has been followed by a new record high.

• These changes are not done often to ensure the index’s stability and continuity.
• Then, in the last few months of 2023, investors began piling back in as hopes grew that interest rates would soon be cut and a nasty recession averted.
• This surpassed the previous record of 45,014.04 from December 2024.
• When negative, the current price is that much lower than the highest price reported for the period.
• While it wasn’t as dramatic as the Great Depression, the drop happened much more quickly.

Record Highs Set in 2022

The highest intraday level was just above 45,100 on December 4, 2024, before closing at 45,014.04. The downturn reflected a 10-month recession, from July 1953 to May 1954, during the military demobilization following the Korean War. It beat its January high, rising to 9,093.24 by the close of the day.

1982 Recession

By Jan. 20, it closed at 15,766.74, as investors panicked over plummeting oil prices, the devaluation of the yuan, and turmoil in China’s stock market. The Dow hit one milestone and had 26 closing records in 2016. Of the 26 records set that year, 17 occurred after the presidential election.

Since the Dow tracks just 30 large-cap U.S. companies, some critics argue that it is too narrow to represent the state of the overall U.S. economy. Given its large-cap focus, the roster of companies included in the Dow fails to include companies of other sizes. Many market observers think the S&P 500 is a much better representation Best gold etfs of the economy, as it includes 500 companies and draws more widely from different sectors. These changes are not done often to ensure the index’s stability and continuity. Since the Great Depression, 2007 to 2008 has been the most dramatic period for the DJIA. The market fell more than 50% in just a year and a half because of subprime mortgage and credit crisis that kicked off the Great Recession.

Economic & Market Factors Behind the 2024–2025 Dow Highs

When negative, the current price is that much lower than the lowest price reported for the period. For each period, the “Percent From Last” column shows you where the current price is in relationship to the High price for that period. When negative, the current price is that much lower than the highest price reported for the period. When positive, the current price is that much higher than the highest price from that period.

• That correction was more than 16% lower than its all-time high set in May of the same year, putting the index into a correction but not a bear market.
• The S&P 500 and Nasdaq rebounded 1.1% and 1.3% on Friday, respectively, after both indexes posted their worst trading days since late April.
• The previous high was recorded just a day prior, when the index ended the trading day at 36,585.06.
• For long-term investors, these milestones are reminders to stay disciplined.

The Dow’s activity broke new records in terms of downward movement in 2009. While it wasn’t as dramatic as the Great Depression, the drop happened much more quickly. After recovering from its Great Depression level, the Dow continued to be affected by several recessionary periods and crises leading up to the 2009 downturn. A November streak occurred after Donald Trump’s presidential win on Nov. 8. Traders were confident in a business-friendly Republican president. The Dow responded with new highs throughout the latter part of 2019, even though trade negotiations had broken down until November.

What Do New Dow Highs Mean for Investors in 2025?

The Dow tracks 30 large, publicly owned blue-chip companies trading on the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq. The selection is not based on strict quantitative criteria but rather on the decisions of the editors of the Wall Street Journal. Companies are chosen based on their reputation, growth, and relevance to the economy, with the aim of reflecting the overall health and trends of the industrial sector of the U.S. economy. The Dow also lost 26.5% during the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. It hit an all-time high of 34,200.67 points on Apr. 16, 2021. In the autumn, it began to consistently close above 35,000 points, and by the last week in December 2021, it surpassed 36,000 points.

It hit a milestone on July 11, closing above 27,000, and then another on Nov. 15, closing above 28,000 (in the chart below, milestones are noted). The Dow Jones Industrial Average (the Dow) is an index of the 30 top-performing U.S. companies. The most recent all-time-high record (as of this writing) was on Jan. 4, 2022, when it closed at 36,799.65. Shows historical Highs and Lows for a number of periods, based on your selected view. High and Low prices and the date of their trades are shown, along with the Percent Change from the start of the current period’s High and Low price. For the period selected at the top right of the page, you will see the Date, Open, High, Low, Last, Change, Change Percent, and Volume for the current trading session plus the previous 4 sessions.

The Dow kept hitting record highs in late 2024, reaching over 45,000 in December of that year. Stocks with higher prices (like UnitedHealth or Goldman Sachs) have more impact on the index than lower-priced stocks, even if they’re smaller companies. The Dow suffered a market correction between August 2015 and April 19, 2016, leading to a 2016 downturn. It began on Jan. 4, when the Dow closed 160 points lower as investors worried about a slowdown in China’s economic growth. All these events created a lot of uncertainty for investors and the Dow bore the brunt of it, falling into a bear market in September 2022. Despite all time highs early in the year, six of the 20 worst-one day point losses for the Dow occurred in 2022.