Historians do not give a single exact “end date,” but most agree the Great Depression effectively ended in the late 1930s or early 1940s, depending on the country. In many places, economic recovery began around 1933, but full recovery often came only with the economic mobilization for World War II, especially by 1940–1941 in the United States.

Global timeline

• Worldwide, the Great Depression is often dated from 1929 to about 1939, with recovery starting in most countries around 1933.

• Some economic historians describe the downturn as lasting roughly a decade, ending as wartime production ramped up during World War II.

United States specifically

• In the United States, the worst contraction bottomed out in 1933, and the economy grew significantly in the mid‑1930s, though unemployment remained high.

• Many scholars consider the Depression in the U.S. to have fully ended only when World War II mobilization eliminated mass unemployment around 1940–1941.