A Freediver Held His Breath For Almost Half an Hour—and Obliterated a World Record
The new and old records were set by inhaling pure oxygen to help the oxygen-carbon dioxide balance. The unaided record is still over 11 minutes.
A Freediver Smashed the Longest-Held Breath Record Stefano Oppo - Getty Images Here’s what you’ll learn when you read this story: Croatian freediver Vitomir Maričić broke the world record for longest human breath hold with a stunning 29 minutes and 3 seconds—almost five minutes longer than the previous record, set in 2021. Maričić’s 2025 record was oxygen-assisted, meaning that he was able to breathe pure oxygen for several minutes before making his attempt. While this record doubles the maximum breath-hold of bottle nose dolphins and even rivals some seals, it still falls way short of many other marine mammals.
The act of breathing has been central to life on Earth since the beginning, and the average human will take more than 600 million breaths in a single lifetime. But there’s a specific group of humans—a subclass of freedivers known as apneists—who train their minds and bodies to efficiently halt this intuitive autonomic function, far exceeding the typical 30-to-90-second limit of breath-holding. Take, for instance, Croatian freediver Budimir Šobat.
On March 27, 2021, Šobat held his breath underwater for an astounding 24 minutes and 37 seconds—a feat that was only possible thanks to minutes of huffing pure oxygen before making the attempt. Four years later, fellow countryman and freediver Vitomir Maričić exceeded this world record—and it wasn’t even close. On June 14, 2025 in Opatija, Croatia, Maričić performed an oxygen-assisted breath hold that shattered Šobat’s by nearly a full five minutes , clocking in at 29 min and 3 seconds .
A member of the Adriatic Freediving group, Maričić performed the attempt in a three-meter-deep pool at the town’s Bristol Hotel in front of a 100-person crowd, according to the website Divernet. He says he took on this record as both a personal challenge and a way to raise awareness for ocean conservation . “After the 20-minute mark, everything became easier, at least mentally,” Maričić told Divernet .