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The temperature sensitivity of soil respiration is a main factor determining the response of global terrestrial soil carbon to global warming and, consequently, its feedback on atmospheric CO₂ concentrations. A data synthesis was performed to summarize information available in the literature on the temperature sensitivity of soil respiration obtained in laboratory soil incubations and expressed as Q₁₀. The influence of common experimental variables and methods, i.e. range of incubation temperatures, length of incubation, calculation methods, and amounts of soil organic carbon, was analyzed. We found a small but significant difference between the Q₁₀ values calculated with different experimental methods as well as time-related trends showing an initial decrease followed by stable values. Q₁₀ values ranged from 0.5 to over 300 and were negatively correlated with temperature, but only at the range of temperatures …