The simplest way to understand Sudan in September 2026 is to separate movement from recovery. More people are returning to some areas where fighting has receded, yet the country still has one of the world’s largest displacement and hunger emergencies, while the center of active conflict is putting new pressure on Kordofan.
IOM’s July snapshot counted about 8.62 million internally displaced people and 4.93 million returnees. The IDP total had fallen roughly 26 percent from the peak, while returns increased about 5 percent in a month. That is a meaningful change. It suggests that parts of Sudan are becoming accessible enough for families to go back. But the same data also show that 55 percent of people still displaced are children, and a return does not guarantee a functioning home, school, clinic or water system.
UNHCR measures the displacement picture differently. Its Sudan situation portal counted more than 11.29 million forcibly displaced people linked to the crisis as of August 24, including people inside Sudan and millions who had crossed borders. The difference between the two agencies’ internal-displacement totals reflects different definitions and reporting categories, not a sudden disappearance of millions of people.
What has not changed is the national scale of need. UNICEF’s 2026 planning figure is 33.7 million people requiring humanitarian assistance, including 17.3 million children. Food insecurity remains severe: about 19.5 million people faced Crisis-level hunger or worse, and analysts projected as many as 200,000 people could be in Catastrophe conditions during the June-to-September lean season. Famine risk was identified across parts of Darfur and Kordofan.
The location of the most acute pressure has changed. WFP has described El Obeid in North Kordofan as a new epicenter of displacement and hunger. In June, active conflict blocked planned food assistance for an estimated 200,000 people. On August 30, two clearly marked WFP trucks outside Dilling in South Kordofan were hit in an aerial attack. More than 50 tons of food were destroyed, enough to feed 5,800 people for a month.
Sudan’s health system is also operating with little reserve. WHO said in April that 37 percent of health facilities were nonfunctional and about 21 million people lacked needed health services. The agency had verified 217 attacks on health care since April 2023. With cholera and other diseases circulating, even a localized increase in fighting can have a national health effect by cutting roads, displacing patients and interrupting vaccine and medicine deliveries.
Children offer another measure of how little the crisis has eased. UNICEF reported at least 330 children killed or injured in the first six months of 2026, with Darfur and Kordofan recording the highest levels. More than eight million school-age children were out of school at midyear. In Darfur, school closures and nonattendance were especially severe.
Humanitarian agencies continue to reach millions. UNICEF screened 1.43 million children for acute malnutrition in July and admitted more than 82,000 children with severe acute malnutrition for treatment that month. WFP says it reaches more than four million people each month. Yet UNICEF’s appeal was still 63 percent underfunded at the end of July.
So the useful brief is this: Sudan has pockets of return, but not a broad return to normal life. Kordofan is taking on more of the war’s direct pressure, while hunger, health-system damage and interrupted education remain nationwide problems. The next months will depend on whether aid routes stay open through the lean season and whether returning families can find services robust enough to make return sustainable.