In 2023, 13,529 recorded murders in the United States were committed by firearm. This is a decrease from the previous year, when 12,244 homicides were committed with a firearm in the country. However, figures may not accurately reflect the total number of homicides, as not all law enforcement agencies in the U.S. submitted homicide data.

The graph shows the number of gun deaths per year in the United States from 1999 to 2023. The x-axis represents the years, while the y-axis displays the annual count of gun-related fatalities. The data ranges from a low of 28,663 gun deaths in 2000 to a high of 48,830 in 2021. From 1999 to 2014, the numbers remained relatively stable with slight fluctuations. However, gun deaths began increasing significantly after 2015, peaking in 2021 before a slight decline in 2022 and 2023. The graph highlights long-term trends in gun-related fatalities, emphasizing a notable rise in recent years.

In recent years, gun violence in the United States has become an alarmingly common occurrence. From 2016, there has been over ****** homicides by firearm in the U.S. each year and firearms have been found to make up the majority of murder weapons in the country by far, demonstrating increasing rates of gun violence occurring throughout the nation. As of 2025, Mississippi was the state with the highest gun violence rate per 100,000 residents in the United States, at **** percent, followed by Louisiana, at **** percent. In comparison, Massachusetts had a gun violence rate of *** percent, the lowest out of all the states. The importance of gun laws Gun laws in the United States vary from state to state, which has been found to affect the differing rates of gun violence throughout the country. Fewer people die by gun violence in states where gun safety laws have been passed, while gun violence rates remain high in states where gun usage is easily permitted and even encouraged. In addition, some states suffer from high rates of gun violence despite having strong gun safety laws due to gun trafficking, as traffickers can distribute firearms illegally past state lines. The right to bear arms Despite evidence from other countries demonstrating that strict gun control measures reduce rates of gun violence, the United States has remained reluctant to enact gun control laws. This can largely be attributed to the Second Amendment of the Constitution, which states that citizens have the right to bear arms. Consequently, gun control has become a highly partisan issue in the U.S., with ** percent of Democrats believing that it was more important to limit gun ownership while ** percent of Republicans felt that it was more important to protect the right of Americans to own guns.

Handguns are by far the most common murder weapon used in the United States, accounting for 7,159 homicides in 2023. This is followed by firearms of an unstated type, with 5,295 cases in that year. Why do murders happen in the U.S.? While most of the time the circumstances of murders in the U.S. remain unknown, homicides due to narcotics come in as the second most common circumstance – making them more common than, for example, gang killings. Despite these gruesome facts, the violent crime rate has fallen significantly since 1990, and the United States is much safer than it was in the 1980s and 1990s. Knife crime vs disease: Leading causes of death The death rate in the U.S. had hovered around the same level since 1990 until there was a large increase due to the COVID-19 pandemic in recent years. Heart disease, cancer, and accidents were the three leading causes of death in the country in 2022. The rate of death from heart disease is significantly higher than the homicide rate in the United States, at 167.2 deaths per 100,000 population compared to a 5.7 homicides per 100,000. Given just 1,562 murders were caused by knife crime, it is fair to say that heart disease is a far bigger killer in the U.S.

In 2022, there were ****** fatalities caused by injuries related to firearms in the United States, a slight decrease from the previous year. In 2021, there were ****** firearm deaths, the highest number of gun deaths ever recorded in the country. However, this figure has remained relatively high over the past 25 years, with ****** firearm deaths in 1990, and a slight dip in fatalities between 1999 and 2002. Firearms in the United States The right to own firearms in the United States is enshrined in the 2nd Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, and while this right may be seen as quintessentially American, the relationship between Americans and their firearms has become fraught in the last few years. The proliferation of mass shootings in the U.S. has brought the topic of gun control into the national spotlight, with support for banning assault-style weapons a particularly divisive issue among Americans. Gun control With a little less than **** of all Americans owning at least one firearm and the highest rate of civilian gun ownership in the world, it is easy to see how the idea of gun control is a political minefield in the U.S. However, public opinion has begun to shift over the past ten years, and a majority of Americans report that laws governing the sale of firearms should be stricter than they are now.

In 2023, 76.37 percent of homicides were committed by firearm in the United States, compared to 85.7 percent in 2021. This figure has been increasing since 2014, when 63.6 percent of homicides were committed by firearm. Firearms in the United States Firearms in the United States have become a large part of American culture. The Second Amendment of the Constitution protects the right to keep and bear arms. This amendment has been cited as a reason why gun control laws should not become stricter. However, many Americans are in favor of stricter gun control laws due to the increase of shootings in the country. Handguns were the most frequently used weapon used on murder victims in 2020, and overall, the United States was the country with the highest rate of civilian-owned firearms. Who owns firearms? Firearms are more popular in certain parts of the United States than others. Texas was the state with the highest number of registered weapons in 2021, with Florida, Virginia, California, and Pennsylvania rounding out the top five. Firearm laws vary from state to state, which means it is easier to obtain a firearm in some states than in others. Gun owners in the United States are typically white, and men are more likely to personally own a gun than women.

In the United States, Black people have higher rates of gun homicide than White people across all age groups. As of 2022, gun homicide rates were highest among Black people aged between 15 and 24 years, at ***** gun homicides per 100,000 of the population. In comparison, there were only **** gun homicides per 100,000 of the White population within this age range. However, the risk for gun homicide was greatest among all adolescents and adults between the ages of 15 to 44 in that year. The impact of guns on young Americans In the last few years, firearms have become the leading cause of death for American children and teenagers aged one to 19 years old, accounting for more deaths than car crashes and diseases. School shootings also remain on the rise recently, with the U.S. recording ** times as many school shootings than other high-income nations from 2009 to 2018. Black students in particular experience a disproportionately high number of school shootings relative to their population, and K-12 teachers at schools made up mostly of students of color are more likely to report feeling afraid that they or their students would be a victim of attack or harm. The right to bear arms Despite increasingly high rates of gun-related violence, gun ownership remains a significant part of American culture, largely due to the fact that the right to bear arms is written into the U.S. Constitution. Although firearms are the most common murder weapon used in the U.S., accounting for approximately ****** homicides in 2022, almost **** of American households have at least one firearm in their possession. Consequently, it is evident that firearms remain easily accessible nationwide, even though gun laws may vary from state to state. However, the topic of gun control still causes political controversy, as the majority of Republicans agree that it is more important to protect the right of Americans to own guns, while Democrats are more inclined to believe that it is more important to limit gun ownership.

THIS DATASET WAS LAST UPDATED AT 2:11 PM EASTERN ON JULY 4

OVERVIEW

2019 had the most mass killings since at least the 1970s, according to the Associated Press/USA TODAY/Northeastern University Mass Killings Database.

In all, there were 45 mass killings, defined as when four or more people are killed excluding the perpetrator. Of those, 33 were mass shootings . This summer was especially violent, with three high-profile public mass shootings occurring in the span of just four weeks, leaving 38 killed and 66 injured.

A total of 229 people died in mass killings in 2019.

The AP's analysis found that more than 50% of the incidents were family annihilations, which is similar to prior years. Although they are far less common, the 9 public mass shootings during the year were the most deadly type of mass murder, resulting in 73 people's deaths, not including the assailants.

One-third of the offenders died at the scene of the killing or soon after, half from suicides.

About this Dataset

The Associated Press/USA TODAY/Northeastern University Mass Killings database tracks all U.S. homicides since 2006 involving four or more people killed (not including the offender) over a short period of time (24 hours) regardless of weapon, location, victim-offender relationship or motive. The database includes information on these and other characteristics concerning the incidents, offenders, and victims.

The AP/USA TODAY/Northeastern database represents the most complete tracking of mass murders by the above definition currently available. Other efforts, such as the Gun Violence Archive or Everytown for Gun Safety may include events that do not meet our criteria, but a review of these sites and others indicates that this database contains every event that matches the definition, including some not tracked by other organizations.

This data will be updated periodically and can be used as an ongoing resource to help cover these events.

Using this Dataset

To get basic counts of incidents of mass killings and mass shootings by year nationwide, use these queries:

Mass killings by year

Mass shootings by year

To get these counts just for your state:

Filter killings by state

Definition of "mass murder"

Mass murder is defined as the intentional killing of four or more victims by any means within a 24-hour period, excluding the deaths of unborn children and the offender(s). The standard of four or more dead was initially set by the FBI.

This definition does not exclude cases based on method (e.g., shootings only), type or motivation (e.g., public only), victim-offender relationship (e.g., strangers only), or number of locations (e.g., one). The time frame of 24 hours was chosen to eliminate conflation with spree killers, who kill multiple victims in quick succession in different locations or incidents, and to satisfy the traditional requirement of occurring in a “single incident.”

Offenders who commit mass murder during a spree (before or after committing additional homicides) are included in the database, and all victims within seven days of the mass murder are included in the victim count. Negligent homicides related to driving under the influence or accidental fires are excluded due to the lack of offender intent. Only incidents occurring within the 50 states and Washington D.C. are considered.

Methodology

Project researchers first identified potential incidents using the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Supplementary Homicide Reports (SHR). Homicide incidents in the SHR were flagged as potential mass murder cases if four or more victims were reported on the same record, and the type of death was murder or non-negligent manslaughter.

Cases were subsequently verified utilizing media accounts, court documents, academic journal articles, books, and local law enforcement records obtained through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Each data point was corroborated by multiple sources, which were compiled into a single document to assess the quality of information.

In case(s) of contradiction among sources, official law enforcement or court records were used, when available, followed by the most recent media or academic source.

Case information was subsequently compared with every other known mass murder database to ensure reliability and validity. Incidents listed in the SHR that could not be independently verified were excluded from the database.

Project researchers also conducted extensive searches for incidents not reported in the SHR during the time period, utilizing internet search engines, Lexis-Nexis, and Newspapers.com. Search terms include: [number] dead, [number] killed, [number] slain, [number] murdered, [number] homicide, mass murder, mass shooting, massacre, rampage, family killing, familicide, and arson murder. Offender, victim, and location names were also directly searched when available.

This project started at USA TODAY in 2012.

Contacts

Contact AP Data Editor Justin Myers with questions, suggestions or comments about this dataset at jmyers@ap.org. The Northeastern University researcher working with AP and USA TODAY is Professor James Alan Fox, who can be reached at j.fox@northeastern.edu or 617-416-4400.

Mortality rate from firearms includes homicides, suicides, accidental deaths, deaths by law enforcement, and deaths for which intent was undetermined. Mortality rate is based on the location of residence and has been age-adjusted to the 2000 U.S. standard population. ICD 10 codes used to identify firearm deaths are W32-W34, X72-X74, X93-X95, Y22-Y24, Y35.0, and U01.4. Single-year data are only available for Los Angeles County overall, Service Planning Areas, Supervisorial Districts, City of Los Angeles overall, and City of Los Angeles Council Districts.Violence is a public health crisis in the US, with gun violence being a major driver. In the US, the age-adjusted homicide rate from firearms is more than 20 times higher than in the European Union or in Australia. Significant disparities by age, sex, and race and ethnicity exist, with young adults (ages 15-34 years), males, and Black individuals most disproportionately impacted. Firearm-related suicides disproportionately impact older, White men. Comprehensive prevention strategies should work to address underlying physical, social, economic, and structural conditions known to increase risk.For more information about the Community Health Profiles Data Initiative, please see the initiative homepage.

Number of homicide victims, by method used to commit the homicide (total methods used; shooting; stabbing; beating; strangulation; fire (burns or suffocation); other methods used; methods used unknown), Canada, 1974 to 2023.

In 2023, about 1,459 homicides were committed with the use of firearms in Texas. A further 1,334 homicides were committed with a firearm in California in that year. A ranking of the total number of murders by U.S. state can be found here.

Number and percentage of homicide victims, by type of firearm used to commit the homicide (total firearms; handgun; rifle or shotgun; fully automatic firearm; sawed-off rifle or shotgun; firearm-like weapons; other firearms, type unknown), Canada, 1974 to 2018.

3,013 murderers in the United States in 2023 were individuals between the ages of 20 and 24. In the same year, there were seven murderer offenders aged between one and four years. Murder rate in the United States Despite some feeling that violent crime in the United States is on the rise, perhaps due to sensationalized media coverage, the murder and nonnegligent manslaughter rate has declined steeply since 1990. The murder rate has risen some since 2014, but it is nowhere near its peak in 1991. Murder victims in the U.S. The vast majority of murders in the U.S. were committed with firearms, including handguns, rifles, shotguns, and other unidentified guns or firearms. This is generally attributed to the high rate of gun ownership in the United States, which makes guns more accessible than in other countries.

This statistic shows the number of gun deaths in the United States annually as an average from the years 2012 to 2014, by race per 100,000 population. On average, there were 20 deaths per 100,000 people annually among to the black population of the United States. The corresponding rate among the white population was nearly half at 11.2 gun deaths per 100,000 people annually.

1) Data Introduction • The Gun Violence Dataset in US is a tabularized data set for gun violence analysis that includes the date, location, victim and suspect information, and geographic coordinates of major 2024 shootings across the U.S.

2) Data Utilization (1) Gun Violence Dataset in US has characteristics that: • Each row contains key information about the shooting, including incident-specific ID, date of occurrence, state and city/county, number of deaths and injuries, suspects (death, injury, arrest), latitude, and longitude. • Data is designed to analyze the distribution of gun incidents and the extent of damage by month and region, and spatial analysis through geographic coordinates is also possible. (2) Gun Violence Dataset in US can be used to: • Analysis of shooting trends by region: Use data by location, magnitude of damage, and time to visualize and analyze the regional and temporal distribution and risk areas of gun violence. • Establishing public safety policies and prevention strategies: Based on victim and suspect information and incident characteristics, it can be used to establish effective gun control, prevention policies, resource allocation strategies, and more.

BackgroundGun violence has shortened the average life expectancy of Americans, and better knowledge about the root causes of gun violence is crucial to its prevention. While some empirical evidence exists regarding the impacts of social and economic factors on violence and firearm homicide rates, to the author’s knowledge, there has yet to be a comprehensive and comparative lagged, multilevel investigation of major social determinants of health in relation to firearm homicides and mass shootings.Methods and findingsThis study used negative binomial regression models and geolocated gun homicide incident data from January 1, 2015, to December 31, 2015, to explore and compare the independent associations of key state-, county-, and neighborhood-level social determinants of health—social mobility, social capital, income inequality, racial and economic segregation, and social spending—with neighborhood firearm-related homicides and mass shootings in the United States, accounting for relevant state firearm laws and a variety of state, county, and neighborhood (census tract [CT]) characteristics. Latitude and longitude coordinates on firearm-related deaths were previously collected by the Gun Violence Archive, and then linked by the British newspaper The Guardian to CTs according to 2010 Census geographies. The study population consisted of all 74,134 CTs as defined for the 2010 Census in the 48 states of the contiguous US. The final sample spanned 70,579 CTs, containing an estimated 314,247,908 individuals, or 98% of the total US population in 2015. The analyses were based on 13,060 firearm-related deaths in 2015, with 11,244 non-mass shootings taking place in 8,673 CTs and 141 mass shootings occurring in 138 CTs. For area-level social determinants, lag periods of 3 to 17 years were examined based on existing theory, empirical evidence, and data availability. County-level institutional social capital (levels of trust in institutions), social mobility, income inequality, and public welfare spending exhibited robust relationships with CT-level gun homicide rates and the total numbers of combined non-mass and mass shooting homicide incidents and non-mass shooting homicide incidents alone. A 1–standard deviation (SD) increase in institutional social capital was linked to a 19% reduction in the homicide rate (incidence rate ratio [IRR] = 0.81, 95% CI 0.73–0.91, p

This study was undertaken to obtain information on the characteristics of gun ownership, gun-carrying practices, and weapons-related incidents in the United States -- specifically, gun use and other weapons used in self-defense against humans and animals. Data were gathered using a national random-digit-dial telephone survey. The respondents were comprised of 1,905 randomly-selected adults aged 18 and older living in the 50 United States. All interviews were completed between May 28 and July 2, 1996. The sample was designed to be a representative sample of households, not of individuals, so researchers did not interview more than one adult from each household. To start the interview, six qualifying questions were asked, dealing with (1) gun ownership, (2) gun-carrying practices, (3) gun display against the respondent, (4) gun use in self-defense against animals, (5) gun use in self-defense against people, and (6) other weapons used in self-defense. A "yes" response to a qualifying question led to a series of additional questions on the same topic as the qualifying question. Part 1, Survey Data, contains the coded data obtained during the interviews, and Part 2, Open-Ended-Verbatim Responses, consists of the answers to open-ended questions provided by the respondents. Information collected for Part 1 covers how many firearms were owned by household members, types of firearms owned (handguns, revolvers, pistols, fully automatic weapons, and assault weapons), whether the respondent personally owned a gun, reasons for owning a gun, type of gun carried, whether the gun was ever kept loaded, kept concealed, used for personal protection, or used for work, and whether the respondent had a permit to carry the gun. Additional questions focused on incidents in which a gun was displayed in a hostile manner against the respondent, including the number of times such an incident took place, the location of the event in which the gun was displayed against the respondent, whether the police were contacted, whether the individual displaying the gun was known to the respondent, whether the incident was a burglary, robbery, or other planned assault, and the number of shots fired during the incident. Variables concerning gun use by the respondent in self-defense against an animal include the number of times the respondent used a gun in this manner and whether the respondent was hunting at the time of the incident. Other variables in Part 1 deal with gun use in self-defense against people, such as the location of the event, if the other individual knew the respondent had a gun, the type of gun used, any injuries to the respondent or to the individual that required medical attention or hospitalization, whether the incident was reported to the police, whether there were any arrests, whether other weapons were used in self-defense, the type of other weapon used, location of the incident in which the other weapon was used, and whether the respondent was working as a police officer or security guard or was in the military at the time of the event. Demographic variables in Part 1 include the gender, race, age, household income, and type of community (city, suburb, or rural) in which the respondent lived. Open-ended questions asked during the interview comprise the variables in Part 2. Responses include descriptions of where the respondent was when he or she displayed a gun (in self-defense or otherwise), specific reasons why the respondent displayed a gun, how the other individual reacted when the respondent displayed the gun, how the individual knew the respondent had a gun, whether the police were contacted for specific self-defense events, and if not, why not.

This indicator is based on location of residence. Mortality rate has been age-adjusted to the 2000 U.S. standard population. ICD 10 codes used to identify homicides are X85-Y09, Y87.1, and U01-U02. Single-year data are only available for Los Angeles County overall, Service Planning Areas, Supervisorial Districts, City of Los Angeles overall, and City of Los Angeles Council Districts.Violence is a public health crisis in the US, with gun violence being a major driver. Almost three quarters of homicides involve firearms. In the US, the age-adjusted homicide rate from firearms is more than 20 times higher than in the European Union or in Australia. Significant disparities by age, sex, and race and ethnicity exist, with young adults ages 15-34 years, males, and Black individuals most disproportionately impacted. Comprehensive prevention strategies should work to address the underlying physical, social, economic, and structural conditions known to increase risk.For more information about the Community Health Profiles Data Initiative, please see the initiative homepage.

The United States is ranked first in gun possession globally and is among the countries suffering the most from firearm violence. Several aspects of the US firearm ecosystem have been detailed over the years, mostly focusing on nation- or state-level phenomena. Systematic, high-resolution studies that compare US cities are largely lacking, leaving several questions open. For example, how does firearm violence vary with the population size of a US city? Are guns more prevalent and accessible in larger cities? In search of answers to these questions, we apply urban scaling theory, which has been instrumental in understanding the present and future of urbanization for the past 15 years. We collate a dataset about firearm violence, accessibility and ownership in 929 cities, ranging from 10,000 to 20,000,000 people. We discover superlinear scaling of firearm violence (measured through the incidence of firearm homicides and armed robberies) and sublinear scaling of both firearm ownership (inferred from the percentage of suicides that are committed with firearm) and firearm accessibility (measured as the prevalence of federal firearm-selling licenses). To investigate the mechanism underlying the US firearm ecosystem, we establish a novel information-theoretic methodology that infers associations from the variance of urban features about scaling laws. We unveil influence of violence and firearm accessibility on firearm ownership, which we model through a Cobb–Douglas function. Such an influence suggests that self-protection could be a critical driver of firearm ownership in US cities, whose extent is moderated by access to firearms.

Pueblo, Colorado, was the United States city that experienced the largest surge in its gun homicide rate in 2021, with an increase of 119 percent compared to the previous year. Pueblo was followed by the Texan city of Amarillo and its growth of 117 percent in the homicide rate, while Michigan's Lansing endured an increment of 112 percent.