In 2025, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints reported a record 385,490 converts, boosting the faith’s global membership past 17.8 million.

Well, according to a high-level church leader, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

In an Oct. 13 speech at church-owned Brigham Young University-Hawaii, Presiding Bishop W. Christopher Waddell said that convert baptisms are up 20% this year over last. That translates to a possible 450,000 to 500,000 convert baptisms in 2026, said Waddell, noting that Africa alone is on pace to add 120,000 converts.

“It’s a remarkable thing that’s taking place,” he said. “This work continues to accelerate across the world.”

Waddell also highlighted the uptick in full-time missionaries to a record 90,000-plus, thanks largely to an increase of young female proselytizers after the church lowered the minimum age for women to 18 (same as it is for men).

He said women recently made up more than half the missionaries at the faith’s flagship Missionary Training Center, in Provo. They now account for more than a third of the worldwide missionary force.

“I don’t know if that ever happened before,” Waddell said.

Overseeing the church’s finances

As presiding bishop, Waddell and his two counselors act as the ecclesiastical overlords of the Utah-based faith’s vast financial, real estate, investment and charitable operations.

The latest federal disclosure valued a publicly reported church stock portfolio at nearly $61 billion, and the faith remains one of the nation’s largest private landowners.

“I can assure you that those who oversee the funds of the church are deeply mindful of the offerings,” he said, and “that the offerings represent the sacrifice and faith of members all over the world — from the wealthiest members to the widow’s mite.”

Waddell pointed out that the faith employs professionals to “allocate and invest church funds” but noted Latter-day Saint leaders also “seek inspiration from the Lord on how they can be used to further the mission of the church.”

The anticipated surge in membership — at least as recorded on the faith’s rolls — caught the attention of an independent researcher.

“The ratio of convert baptisms to full-time missionaries would be approximately 5.1 in 2026 (assuming approximately 90,000 missionaries and 462,588 convert baptisms), the highest such ratio since 2010,” Matt Matrinich, who tracks church growth, wrote Thursday on his website, ldschurchgrowth.blogspot.com. “Church membership will likely range between 18.3 million to 18.4 million at the end of the year.”

Temples to top 400

Waddell also forecast that the church will surpass 400 temples “in the near future.” The faith currently has 385 existing or planned temples in the world.

“His comment,” Martinich wrote, “suggests that at least 16 additional temples may be announced in the relatively near future.”

Unlike the church’s more common meetinghouses, temples are where devout Latter-day Saints participate in their faith’s highest religious rites, such as eternal marriage.

Taken together, the temple and membership “trends suggest that the expansion of the full-time missionary force is being accompanied by increased convert baptisms per missionary,” Martinich concluded, “indicating that the recent growth in convert baptisms cannot be attributed solely to having more missionaries.”