California reported the largest number of homicides to the FBI in 2023, at 1,929 for the year. Texas recorded the second-highest number of murders, with 1,845 for the year. Homicide victim demographics There were a total of 19,252 reported homicide cases in the U.S. in 2023. When looking at murder victims by gender and ethnicity, the vast majority were male, while just over half of the victims were Black or African American. In addition, homicide victims in the United States were found most likely to be between the ages of 20 and 34 years old, with the majority of victims aged between 17 to 54 years old. Are murders up? In short, no – since the 1990s the number of murders in the U.S. has decreased significantly. In 1990, the murder rate per 100,000 people stood at 9.4, and stood at 5.7 in 2023. It should be noted though that the number of homicides increased slightly from 2014 to 2017, although figures declined again in 2018 and 2019, before ticking up once more in 2020 and 2021. Despite this decline, when viewed in international comparison, the U.S. murder rate is still notably high. For example, the Canadian homicide rate stood at 1.94 in 2023, while the homicide rate in England and Wales was even lower.

In the last four years, May has been the most violent month in Mexico in three of them, exception for 2023, when June was the most violent month of the year. The peak of violence happened in May 2021, when an average of 150 people were murdered every day. On the other hand, October 2023 was the least violent month in this period of time, with an average of 125 people murdered daily.

The UNIFORM CRIME REPORTING PROGRAM DATA: SUPPLEMENTARY HOMICIDE REPORTS, 2021 (SHR) provide detailed information on criminal homicides reported to the police. These homicides consist of murders; non-negligent killings also called non-negligent manslaughter; and justifiable homicides. UCR Program contributors compile and submit their crime data by one of two means: either directly to the FBI or through their State UCR Programs. State UCR Programs frequently impose mandatory reporting requirements which have been effective in increasing both the number of reporting agencies as well as the number and accuracy of each participating agency's reports. Each agency may be identified by its numeric state code, alpha-numeric agency ("ORI") code, jurisdiction population, and population group. In addition, each homicide incident is identified by month of occurrence and situation type, allowing flexibility in creating aggregations and subsets.

How many criminal homicides were there in the U.S.? In 2023, there were 19,252 reported cases of murder or non-negligent manslaughter in the United States, a decrease from 21,781 cases reported in the previous year. This figure has also decreased in comparison to 1991, when there were 24,700 reported murder and non-negligent manslaughter cases. Murder vs. Manslaughter While it is can be easy to confuse the two terms, murder and nonnegligent manslaughter are two different crimes. While there is some variation from state to state, murder is usually seen as having some planning or forethought involved in the crime, while manslaughter is considered to be a “crime of passion,” with the absence of forethought. Courts tend to differentiate between the states of mind of the accused when bringing manslaughter or murder charges against them. The victims In the United States, there were far more male murder victims than female murder victims, and Black victims made up a large proportion of the total number of victims. Additionally, many murders in the U.S. are perpetrated by either an acquaintance of the victim or a stranger.

Number, rate and percentage changes in rates of homicide victims, Canada, provinces and territories, 1961 to 2024.

The United States had, by far, the highest homicide rate of the G7 countries between 2000 and 2023. In 2023, it reached 5.76 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants, a decrease from 6.78 in 2021. By comparison, Canada, the G7 nation with the second-highest homicide rate, had 1.98 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants in 2023. Out of each G7 nation, Japan had the lowest rate with 0.23 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants.

Intentional homicides (per 100,000 people) in United States was reported at 6.8075 in 2021, according to the World Bank collection of development indicators, compiled from officially recognized sources. United States - Intentional homicides (per 100;000 people) - actual values, historical data, forecasts and projections were sourced from the World Bank on August of 2025.

Number and rate (per 100,000 population) of homicide victims, Canada and Census Metropolitan Areas, 1981 to 2024.

Historical chart and dataset showing Norway murder/homicide rate per 100K population by year from 1990 to 2021.

This dataset contains individual-level homicide and non-fatal shooting victimizations, including homicide data from 1991 to the present, and non-fatal shooting data from 2010 to the present (2010 is the earliest available year for shooting data). This dataset includes a "GUNSHOT_INJURY_I " column to indicate whether the victimization involved a shooting, showing either Yes ("Y"), No ("N"), or Unknown ("UKNOWN.") For homicides, injury descriptions are available dating back to 1991, so the "shooting" column will read either "Y" or "N" to indicate whether the homicide was a fatal shooting or not. For non-fatal shootings, data is only available as of 2010. As a result, for any non-fatal shootings that occurred from 2010 to the present, the shooting column will read as “Y.” Non-fatal shooting victims will not be included in this dataset prior to 2010; they will be included in the authorized-access dataset, but with "UNKNOWN" in the shooting column.

Each row represents a single victimization, i.e., a unique event when an individual became the victim of a homicide or non-fatal shooting. Each row does not represent a unique victim—if someone is victimized multiple times there will be multiple rows for each of those distinct events.

The dataset is refreshed daily, but excludes the most recent complete day to allow the Chicago Police Department (CPD) time to gather the best available information. Each time the dataset is refreshed, records can change as CPD learns more about each victimization, especially those victimizations that are most recent. The data on the Mayor's Office Violence Reduction Dashboard is updated daily with an approximately 48-hour lag. As cases are passed from the initial reporting officer to the investigating detectives, some recorded data about incidents and victimizations may change once additional information arises. Regularly updated datasets on the City's public portal may change to reflect new or corrected information.

A version of this dataset with additional crime types is available by request. To make a request, please email dataportal@cityofchicago.org with the subject line: Violence Reduction Victims Access Request. Access will require an account on this site, which you may create at https://data.cityofchicago.org/signup.

How does this dataset classify victims?

The methodology by which this dataset classifies victims of violent crime differs by victimization type:

Homicide and non-fatal shooting victims: A victimization is considered a homicide victimization or non-fatal shooting victimization depending on its presence in CPD's homicide victims data table or its shooting victims data table. A victimization is considered a homicide only if it is present in CPD's homicide data table, while a victimization is considered a non-fatal shooting only if it is present in CPD's shooting data tables and absent from CPD's homicide data table.

To determine the IUCR code of homicide and non-fatal shooting victimizations, we defer to the incident IUCR code available in CPD's Crimes, 2001-present dataset (available on the City's open data portal). If the IUCR code in CPD's Crimes dataset is inconsistent with the homicide/non-fatal shooting categorization, we defer to CPD's Victims dataset. For a criminal homicide, the only sensible IUCR codes are 0110 (first-degree murder) or 0130 (second-degree murder). For a non-fatal shooting, a sensible IUCR code must signify a criminal sexual assault, a robbery, or, most commonly, an aggravated battery. In rare instances, the IUCR code in CPD's Crimes and Victims dataset do not align with the homicide/non-fatal shooting categorization:

1. In instances where a homicide victimization does not correspond to an IUCR code 0110 or 0130, we set the IUCR code to "01XX" to indicate that the victimization was a homicide but we do not know whether it was a first-degree murder (IUCR code = 0110) or a second-degree murder (IUCR code = 0130).
2. When a non-fatal shooting victimization does not correspond to an IUCR code that signifies a criminal sexual assault, robbery, or aggravated battery, we enter “UNK” in the IUCR column, “YES” in the GUNSHOT_I column, and “NON-FATAL” in the PRIMARY column to indicate that the victim was non-fatally shot, but the precise IUCR code is unknown.

Other violent crime victims: For other violent crime types, we refer to the IUCR classification that exists in CPD's victim table, with only one exception:

1. When there is an incident that is associated with no victim with a matching IUCR code, we assume that this is an error. Every crime should have at least 1 victim with a matching IUCR code. In these cases, we change the IUCR code to reflect the incident IUCR code because CPD's incident table is considered to be more reliable than the victim table.

Note: The definition of “homicide” (shooting or otherwise) does not include justifiable homicide or involuntary manslaughter. This dataset also excludes any cases that CPD considers to be “unfounded” or “noncriminal.” Officer-involved shootings are not included.

Note: The initial reporting officer usually asks victims to report demographic data. If victims are unable to recall, the reporting officer will use their best judgment. “Unknown” can be reported if it is truly unknown.

Note: In some instances, CPD's raw incident-level data and victim-level data that were inputs into this dataset do not align on the type of crime that occurred. In those instances, this dataset attempts to correct mismatches between incident and victim specific crime types. When it is not possible to determine which victims are associated with the most reliable crime determination, the dataset will show empty cells in the respective demographic fields (age, sex, race, etc.).

Note: Homicide victims names are delayed by two weeks to allow time for the victim’s family to be notified of their passing.

Note: The initial reporting officer usually asks victims to report demographic data. If victims are unable to recall, the reporting officer will use their best judgment. “Unknown” can be reported if it is truly unknown.

Note: This dataset includes variables referencing administrative or political boundaries that are subject to change. These include Street Outreach Organization boundary, Ward, Chicago Police Department District, Chicago Police Department Area, Chicago Police Department Beat, Illinois State Senate District, and Illinois State House of Representatives District. These variables reflect current geographic boundaries as of November 1st, 2021. In some instances, current boundaries may conflict with those that were in place at the time that a given incident occurred in prior years. For example, the Chicago Police Department districts 021 and 013 no longer exist. Any historical violent crime victimization that occurred in those districts when they were in existence are marked in this dataset as having occurred in the current districts that expanded to replace 013 and 021."

CSV file. Incident data for the murder of females over the past decade.

Historical dataset showing North America murder/homicide rate per 100K population by year from 2010 to 2021.

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.

Historical dataset showing Czech Republic murder/homicide rate per 100K population by year from 1994 to 2021.

For a comprehensive guide to this data and other UCR data, please see my book at ucrbook.comVersion 12 release notes:Adds 2021 data.Version 11 release notes:Adds 2020 data. Please note that the FBI has retired UCR data ending in 2020 data so this will be the last SHR data they release. Changes .rda file to .rds.Version 10 release notes:Changes release notes description, does not change data.Version 9 release notes:Adds 2019 data.Version 8 release notes:Adds 2018 data.Changes source of data for years 1985-2018 to be directly from the FBI. 2018 data was received via email from the FBI, 2016-2017 is from the FBI who mailed me a DVD, and 1985-2015 data is from the FBI's Crime Data Explorer site (https://crime-data-explorer.fr.cloud.gov/downloads-and-docs).Adds .csv version of the data.Makes minor changes to value labels for consistency and to fix grammar. Version 7 release notes:Changes project name to avoid confusing this data for the ones done by NACJD.Version 6 release notes:Adds 2017 data.Version 5 release notes:Adds 2016 data.Standardizes the "group" column which categorizes cities and counties by population.Arrange rows in descending order by year and ascending order by ORI. Version 4 release notes: Fix bug where Philadelphia Police Department had incorrect FIPS county code. Version 3 Release Notes:Merges data with LEAIC data to add FIPS codes, census codes, agency type variables, and ORI9 variable.Change column names for relationship variables from offender_n_relation_to_victim_1 to victim_1_relation_to_offender_n to better indicate that all relationship are victim 1's relationship to each offender. Reorder columns.This is a single file containing all data from the Supplementary Homicide Reports from 1976 to 2018. The Supplementary Homicide Report provides detailed information about the victim, offender, and circumstances of the murder. Details include victim and offender age, sex, race, ethnicity (Hispanic/not Hispanic), the weapon used, circumstances of the incident, and the number of both offenders and victims. Years 1976-1984 were downloaded from NACJD, while more recent years are from the FBI. All files came as ASCII+SPSS Setup files and were cleaned using R. The "cleaning" just means that column names were standardized (different years have slightly different spellings for many columns). Standardization of column names is necessary to stack multiple years together. Categorical variables (e.g. state) were also standardized (i.e. fix spelling errors, have terminology be the same across years). The following is the summary of the Supplementary Homicide Report copied from ICPSR's 2015 page for the data.The Uniform Crime Reporting Program Data: Supplementary Homicide Reports (SHR) provide detailed information on criminal homicides reported to the police. These homicides consist of murders; non-negligent killings also called non-negligent manslaughter; and justifiable homicides. UCR Program contributors compile and submit their crime data by one of two means: either directly to the FBI or through their State UCR Programs. State UCR Programs frequently impose mandatory reporting requirements which have been effective in increasing both the number of reporting agencies as well as the number and accuracy of each participating agency's reports. Each agency may be identified by its numeric state code, alpha-numeric agency ("ORI") code, jurisdiction population, and population group. In addition, each homicide incident is identified by month of occurrence and situation type, allowing flexibility in creating aggregations and subsets.

Intentional homicides (per 100,000 people) in Japan was reported at 0.22871 in 2021, according to the World Bank collection of development indicators, compiled from officially recognized sources. Japan - Intentional homicides (per 100;000 people) - actual values, historical data, forecasts and projections were sourced from the World Bank on August of 2025.

Intentional homicides (per 100,000 people) in Australia was reported at 0.74457 in 2021, according to the World Bank collection of development indicators, compiled from officially recognized sources. Australia - Intentional homicides (per 100;000 people) - actual values, historical data, forecasts and projections were sourced from the World Bank on August of 2025.

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 2024.

Historical dataset showing Albania murder/homicide rate per 100K population by year from 1992 to 2021.

Historical dataset showing West Bank and Gaza murder/homicide rate per 100K population by year from 1995 to 2021.