Vladimir Putin set a record in 2026 for the longest gap between publicly shown trips inside Russia and abroad, according to Proekt.
The outlet said Russian state television went more than 200 days without showing the familiar footage of the president visiting regions, industrial facilities or other countries.
In its investigation “The Vanished”, published on May 28, Proekt examined changes in Putin’s public activity and the way the Kremlin presents the president’s work to Russian audiences.
The outlet also noted that the prolonged gap coincided with declines in some polling measures of support for Putin. The coincidence alone does not demonstrate a causal connection between fewer public trips and changes in his ratings.
Different polling organizations also measure attitudes toward the president in different ways — including trust, job approval and open-ended questions — so their figures cannot be directly compared without taking methodology into account.