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Two international summits dedicated to the ocean were held in January 2022 and June 2022: the One Ocean Summit in Brest (France) and the United Nations Ocean Conference in Lisbon (Portugal). Beyond the importance of scientifically established knowledge as a basis for guiding environmental policies and ocean protection, these two conferences highlighted major scientific issues and high expectations towards research which may be summarised in six topics: climate change and the ocean, food i.e. fisheries resources and aquaculture, deep ocean, pollution, polar ocean, marine protected areas, digital ocean, environmental DNA. The two conferences launched or promoted the major international, European and national initiatives that will be shaping ocean sciences, in particular the United Nations Decade of Ocean Sciences for Sustainable Development (2021-2030) and the European mission ‘Restore our Ocean and Waters’. International cooperation around major research infrastructures has been strengthened, as illustrated by the transformation of Mercator Ocean International into an intergovernmental organisation and the shared initiatives of the European oceanographic fleet operators. Overall, we stress the positive results of these events for ocean sciences. Research institutions and support has been organised and the two summits confirm that funding will be made available. The next major event will be the United Nations Ocean Conference, which will be co-organised by France and Costa Rica in 2025. It will be up to the scientific community and the organisers to maintain this momentum by using these major events to advance concrete and structuring international initiatives for ocean sciences.