The Holocaust is generally understood to have ended in 1945, as Nazi Germany was defeated and its system of camps and extermination sites was dismantled in the final months of World War II.

Key dates

  • The Holocaust took place under Nazi rule between 1933 and 1945, with systematic mass murder escalating during the war years.
  • The genocide effectively ended as Allied forces liberated camps and Germany surrendered in May 1945, bringing the Third Reich to an end.

Why 1945 is used as the end

  • By early–mid 1945, most surviving camps had been liberated, the gas chambers shut down, and Nazi leadership collapsing or being captured.
  • Germany’s unconditional surrender on 7–8 May 1945 is taken as the point when the Nazi state—and thus its organized machinery of persecution and mass murder—finally ended.

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