The most recent “Ice Age” (the last glacial period) ended about 11,700 years ago, so it was roughly 12,000 years ago in round numbers.

Quick timeline

  • The most recent major Ice Age, the Pleistocene, ran from about 2.6 million years ago to 11,700 years ago.
  • The last glacial period within that Ice Age lasted from about 115,000 to 11,700 years ago.
  • Its coldest peak, the Last Glacial Maximum, was around 26,000–20,000 years ago.
  • By 11,700 years ago, the climate had warmed into the current Holocene epoch, and the “Ice Age” in the everyday sense was over.

So if you’re asking “how long ago was the Ice Age?” in the usual everyday sense, the answer is: it ended about 11,700 years ago, or roughly 12,000 years in the past.

Note: Geologists still consider Earth to be in a broader ice age today because permanent ice remains on Greenland and Antarctica, but we are in a warm interglacial phase rather than a full glacial period.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.