As of February 2025, El Salvador had the highest prisoner rate worldwide, with over 1,600 prisoners per 100,000 of the national population. Cuba, Rwanda, Turkmenistan, and the United States, rounded out the top five countries with the highest rate of incarceration. Homicides in El Salvador Interestingly, El Salvador, which long had the highest global homicide rates, has dropped out of the top 20 after a high number of gang members have been incarcerated. A high number of the countries with the highest homicide rate are located in Latin America. Prisoners in the United StatesThe United States is home to the largest number of prisoners worldwide. More than 1.8 million people were incarcerated in the U.S. at the beginning of 2025. In China, the estimated prison population totaled 1.69 million people that year. Other nations had far fewer prisoners. The largest share of the U.S. prisoners in federal correctional facilities were of African-American origin. As of 2020, there were 345,500 black, non-Hispanic prisoners, compared to 327,300 white, non-Hispanic inmates. The U.S. states with the largest number of prisoners in 2022 were Texas, California, and Florida. Over 160,000 prisoners in state facilities were sentenced for rape or sexual assault, which was the most common cause of imprisonment. The second most common was murder, followed by aggravated or simple assault.

Overview

The Marshall Project, the nonprofit investigative newsroom dedicated to the U.S. criminal justice system, has partnered with The Associated Press to compile data on the prevalence of COVID-19 infection in prisons across the country. The Associated Press is sharing this data as the most comprehensive current national source of COVID-19 outbreaks in state and federal prisons.

Lawyers, criminal justice reform advocates and families of the incarcerated have worried about what was happening in prisons across the nation as coronavirus began to take hold in the communities outside. Data collected by The Marshall Project and AP shows that hundreds of thousands of prisoners, workers, correctional officers and staff have caught the illness as prisons became the center of some of the country’s largest outbreaks. And thousands of people — most of them incarcerated — have died.

In December, as COVID-19 cases spiked across the U.S., the news organizations also shared cumulative rates of infection among prison populations, to better gauge the total effects of the pandemic on prison populations. The analysis found that by mid-December, one in five state and federal prisoners in the United States had tested positive for the coronavirus -- a rate more than four times higher than the general population.

This data, which is updated weekly, is an effort to track how those people have been affected and where the crisis has hit the hardest.

Methodology and Caveats

The data tracks the number of COVID-19 tests administered to people incarcerated in all state and federal prisons, as well as the staff in those facilities. It is collected on a weekly basis by Marshall Project and AP reporters who contact each prison agency directly and verify published figures with officials.

Each week, the reporters ask every prison agency for the total number of coronavirus tests administered to its staff members and prisoners, the cumulative number who tested positive among staff and prisoners, and the numbers of deaths for each group.

The time series data is aggregated to the system level; there is one record for each prison agency on each date of collection. Not all departments could provide data for the exact date requested, and the data indicates the date for the figures.

To estimate the rate of infection among prisoners, we collected population data for each prison system before the pandemic, roughly in mid-March, in April, June, July, August, September and October. Beginning the week of July 28, we updated all prisoner population numbers, reflecting the number of incarcerated adults in state or federal prisons. Prior to that, population figures may have included additional populations, such as prisoners housed in other facilities, which were not captured in our COVID-19 data. In states with unified prison and jail systems, we include both detainees awaiting trial and sentenced prisoners.

To estimate the rate of infection among prison employees, we collected staffing numbers for each system. Where current data was not publicly available, we acquired other numbers through our reporting, including calling agencies or from state budget documents. In six states, we were unable to find recent staffing figures: Alaska, Hawaii, Kentucky, Maryland, Montana, Utah.

To calculate the cumulative COVID-19 impact on prisoner and prison worker populations, we aggregated prisoner and staff COVID case and death data up through Dec. 15. Because population snapshots do not account for movement in and out of prisons since March, and because many systems have significantly slowed the number of new people being sent to prison, it’s difficult to estimate the total number of people who have been held in a state system since March. To be conservative, we calculated our rates of infection using the largest prisoner population snapshots we had during this time period.

As with all COVID-19 data, our understanding of the spread and impact of the virus is limited by the availability of testing. Epidemiology and public health experts say that aside from a few states that have recently begun aggressively testing in prisons, it is likely that there are more cases of COVID-19 circulating undetected in facilities. Sixteen prison systems, including the Federal Bureau of Prisons, would not release information about how many prisoners they are testing.

Corrections departments in Indiana, Kansas, Montana, North Dakota and Wisconsin report coronavirus testing and case data for juvenile facilities; West Virginia reports figures for juvenile facilities and jails. For consistency of comparison with other state prison systems, we removed those facilities from our data that had been included prior to July 28. For these states we have also removed staff data. Similarly, Pennsylvania’s coronavirus data includes testing and cases for those who have been released on parole. We removed these tests and cases for prisoners from the data prior to July 28. The staff cases remain.

About the Data

There are four tables in this data:

• covid_prison_cases.csv contains weekly time series data on tests, infections and deaths in prisons. The first dates in the table are on March 26. Any questions that a prison agency could not or would not answer are left blank.

• prison_populations.csv contains snapshots of the population of people incarcerated in each of these prison systems for whom data on COVID testing and cases are available. This varies by state and may not always be the entire number of people incarcerated in each system. In some states, it may include other populations, such as those on parole or held in state-run jails. This data is primarily for use in calculating rates of testing and infection, and we would not recommend using these numbers to compare the change in how many people are being held in each prison system.

• staff_populations.csv contains a one-time, recent snapshot of the headcount of workers for each prison agency, collected as close to April 15 as possible.

• covid_prison_rates.csv contains the rates of cases and deaths for prisoners. There is one row for every state and federal prison system and an additional row with the National totals.

Queries

The Associated Press and The Marshall Project have created several queries to help you use this data:

Get your state's prison COVID data: Provides each week's data from just your state and calculates a cases-per-100000-prisoners rate, a deaths-per-100000-prisoners rate, a cases-per-100000-workers rate and a deaths-per-100000-workers rate here

Rank all systems' most recent data by cases per 100,000 prisoners here

Find what percentage of your state's total cases and deaths -- as reported by Johns Hopkins University -- occurred within the prison system here

Attribution

In stories, attribute this data to: “According to an analysis of state prison cases by The Marshall Project, a nonprofit investigative newsroom dedicated to the U.S. criminal justice system, and The Associated Press.”

Contributors

Many reporters and editors at The Marshall Project and The Associated Press contributed to this data, including: Katie Park, Tom Meagher, Weihua Li, Gabe Isman, Cary Aspinwall, Keri Blakinger, Jake Bleiberg, Andrew R. Calderón, Maurice Chammah, Andrew DeMillo, Eli Hager, Jamiles Lartey, Claudia Lauer, Nicole Lewis, Humera Lodhi, Colleen Long, Joseph Neff, Michelle Pitcher, Alysia Santo, Beth Schwartzapfel, Damini Sharma, Colleen Slevin, Christie Thompson, Abbie VanSickle, Adria Watson, Andrew Welsh-Huggins.

Questions

If you have questions about the data, please email The Marshall Project at info+covidtracker@themarshallproject.org or file a Github issue.

To learn more about AP's data journalism capabilities for publishers, corporations and financial institutions, go here or email kromano@ap.org.

At the beginning of 2025, the United States had the highest number of incarcerated individuals worldwide, with around 1.8 million people in prison. China followed with around 100,000 fewer prisoners. Brazil followed in third. The incarceration problem in the U.S. The United States has an incredibly high number of incarcerated individuals. Therefore, the incarceration problem has become a widely contested issue, because it impacts disadvantaged people and minorities the most. Additionally, the prison system has become capitalized by outside corporations that fund prisons, but there is still a high cost to taxpayers. Furthermore, there has been an increase in the amount of private prisons that have been created. For-profit prison companies have come under scrutiny because of their lack of satisfactory staff and widespread lobbying. Violent offenses are the most common type of offense among prisoners in the U.S. Incarceration rates worldwide El Salvador had the highest rate of incarceration worldwide, at 1,659 prisoners per 100,000 residents as of February 2025. Cuba followed in second with 794 prisoners per 100,000 inhabitants. The incarceration rate is a better measure to use when comparing countries than the total prison populations, which will naturally have the most populous countries topping the list.

In 2023 Turkey had the highest incarceration rate among European countries, at 408 prisoners per 100,000 inhabitants, followed by Georgia, which had an incarceration of 256. The country with the lowest incarceration rate in this year was Liechtenstein, which had 15 people in prison for every 100,000 inhabitants. Germany had one of the lowest rates of 69 when compared with other major European countries such as France and England & Wales, which had rates of 106 and 136 respectively. The Russian Federation has in previous years been the country with the highest incarceration rate in the Council of Europe's data, however, as the country was removed as a member of the council in 2022 due to their invasion of Ukraine, data for Russia is no longer available.

In 2022, about 1,826 Black men per 100,000 residents were imprisoned in the United States. This rate was much lower for Black women, at 64 per 100,000 residents. The overall imprisonment rate in 2022 stood at 355 per 100,000 Americans.

Series Name: Unsentenced detainees as a proportion of overall prison population (percent)Series Code: VC_PRS_UNSECRelease Version: 2020.Q2.G.03 This dataset is the part of the Global SDG Indicator Database compiled through the UN System in preparation for the Secretary-General's annual report on Progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals.Indicator 16.3.2: Unsentenced detainees as a proportion of overall prison populationTarget 16.3: Promote the rule of law at the national and international levels and ensure equal access to justice for allGoal 16: Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levelsFor more information on the compilation methodology of this dataset, see https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/metadata/

Due to a hardening of penal sensibilities and more stringent sentencing practices (mainly as a result of the 2003 Criminal Justice Act), a growing number of prisoners are serving extremely long life sentences from an early age. The UK has more life-sentenced prisoners per 100,000 of population than any other country in Europe (including Russia), and a higher proportion of life sentenced prisoners within its total sentenced prison population (10%) than any other European country or the US. The average minimum sentence length for mandatory life sentences has risen significantly in recent years. By the end of December 2018, there were 3,624 prisoners serving life sentences with tariffs of 10-20 years, and 1,862 with tariffs of more than twenty years (Ministry of Justice, 2019).

These prisoners have to endure and adapt to periods inside prison that are often longer than their lives as free citizens, while maturing into adulthood in an environment that does not allow, or is hardly conducive to, normal adult experiences. Following on from an earlier study of long-term imprisonment (grant: ES/J007935/1), undertaken from 2011-2014, this research constituted an unprecedented opportunity to enhance our understanding of the dynamics and effects of long-term confinement. Its primary aims were, first, to meet Kazemian and Travis's (2015) call for longitudinal insight into the experience, dynamics and effects of long-term confinement, including the ways in which the lives, priorities and relationships of people serving life sentences change over time; second, to focus more closely on some of the key themes and findings from our original study, in particular, the ways in which individuals engage reflexively with their sentence, their index offence and their sense of self; and, third, to explore the concept of the 'depth of imprisonment' - put simply, the relationship and polarity between the prison and the outside world - that is of particular relevance for this group of prisoners.

Interviews were undertaken, and surveys re-administered, with as many of our original sample as possible. Overall, this amounted to 120 of 146 initial participants, 100 in prison (out of 110 still in custody when fieldwork began) and 20 (out of 29) who had been released into the community on life licence.

The research offers insight into the nature and impact of long-term imprisonment, at a time when practitioners, pressure groups and policymakers are particularly interested in the custodial and post-custodial experiences of this expanding group. It contributes significantly to a sparse and outdated research literature on the experiences of life-sentenced prisoners, serving extremely long sentences. In doing so, it addresses fundamental questions about identity, coping and humanity under intense duress, and about the lived outcomes of the most extreme form of state punishment.

Mexico had nearly 233,300 prisoners as of December 2023, around 7,200 prisoners more than the prior year. The volume of imprisoned people in the country followed an increasing trend from 2018 to 2023. Prison population That figure places Mexico among the countries with the largest number of prisoners in the world. However, when taking into account incarceration rates, that is, the number of prisoners per 100,000 inhabitants, Mexico falls out of the ranking and is, actually, one of the Latin American and Caribbean countries with the lowest rates, exceeded by far by countries like El Salvador and Cuba, which register four times the prison population rate of Mexico.People aged 30 to 39 years made up for the largest share of prisoners in Mexico. However, the share of people deprived of liberty whose age ranged from 18 to 29 years was significantly largest in the case of women, with 32.1 percent of female prisoners pertaining to such age group, while in the case of men it fell to 25.1 percent. Regarding female inmates, approximately a tenth have been pregnant while being in jail. Furthermore, theft was the most commonly committed crime by women in Mexican states' penitentiary centers in 2022, followed by kidnapping and homicide. Preventive prison The main reason for the rapid growth of prison population in Mexico in recent years is the 2019 reform of the article 19 of the Constitution, which has led to the spread of pretrial detention. Pretrial detention is a measure that leads to the imprisonment of people automatically while they are still being investigated, without having been sentenced, and can last up to two years. The reform allowed for automatic preventive imprisonment for a wider range of crimes than before, with the new list including fuel theft (huachicoleo) and burglary, among others. This affects particularly vulnerable people from poor backgrounds, with low education and who commit petty crimes. As of December 2020, 78.6 percent of pre-trial detainees for robbery in Mexico had not been sentenced, which means that less than a fourth of people in jail for robbery had been found guilty in court. The country had an even higher share of unsentenced prisoners for drug trafficking, with 87.8 percent of people being in preventive detention without charge.. One of the reasons behind the high share of prisoners awaiting sentence is the large number of simultaneous cases that public defenders have to attend to. Depending on the Mexican state in which someone is being prosecuted, a public defender can have up to an average of 336.9 simultaneous cases to defend.

South Korea NJ: Chungnam: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data was reported at 14.000 Person in Mar 2025. This records a decrease from the previous number of 15.000 Person for Feb 2025. South Korea NJ: Chungnam: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data is updated monthly, averaging 13.000 Person from Jan 2018 (Median) to Mar 2025, with 87 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 44.000 Person in Jan 2021 and a record low of 1.000 Person in Nov 2020. South Korea NJ: Chungnam: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Korea. The data is categorized under Global Database’s South Korea – Table KR.G092: New Job Searches.

South Korea NJ: Chungbuk: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data was reported at 25.000 Person in Mar 2025. This records an increase from the previous number of 12.000 Person for Feb 2025. South Korea NJ: Chungbuk: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data is updated monthly, averaging 11.000 Person from Jan 2018 (Median) to Mar 2025, with 87 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 60.000 Person in Jan 2021 and a record low of 1.000 Person in Jun 2020. South Korea NJ: Chungbuk: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Korea. The data is categorized under Global Database’s South Korea – Table KR.G092: New Job Searches.

South Korea NJ: Jeonbuk: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data was reported at 12.000 Person in Mar 2025. This records a decrease from the previous number of 17.000 Person for Feb 2025. South Korea NJ: Jeonbuk: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data is updated monthly, averaging 21.000 Person from Jan 2018 (Median) to Mar 2025, with 87 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 82.000 Person in Dec 2020 and a record low of 1.000 Person in Aug 2018. South Korea NJ: Jeonbuk: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Korea. The data is categorized under Global Database’s South Korea – Table KR.G092: New Job Searches.

South Korea NR: Incheon: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data was reported at 1.000 Person in Mar 2025. This records a decrease from the previous number of 8.000 Person for Feb 2025. South Korea NR: Incheon: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data is updated monthly, averaging 3.000 Person from Jan 2018 (Median) to Mar 2025, with 87 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 9.000 Person in Sep 2021 and a record low of 0.000 Person in May 2020. South Korea NR: Incheon: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Korea. The data is categorized under Global Database’s South Korea – Table KR.G093: New Recruitment.

South Korea NJ: Gyeongbuk: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data was reported at 39.000 Person in Mar 2025. This records an increase from the previous number of 22.000 Person for Feb 2025. South Korea NJ: Gyeongbuk: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data is updated monthly, averaging 26.000 Person from Jan 2018 (Median) to Mar 2025, with 87 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 74.000 Person in Dec 2020 and a record low of 1.000 Person in Feb 2019. South Korea NJ: Gyeongbuk: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Korea. The data is categorized under Global Database’s South Korea – Table KR.G092: New Job Searches.

South Korea NR: Gyeonggi: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data was reported at 22.000 Person in Mar 2025. This records an increase from the previous number of 18.000 Person for Feb 2025. South Korea NR: Gyeonggi: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data is updated monthly, averaging 12.000 Person from Jan 2018 (Median) to Mar 2025, with 87 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 35.000 Person in Sep 2020 and a record low of 2.000 Person in Dec 2019. South Korea NR: Gyeonggi: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Korea. The data is categorized under Global Database’s South Korea – Table KR.G093: New Recruitment.

South Korea NR: Seoul: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data was reported at 6.000 Person in Mar 2025. This records a decrease from the previous number of 16.000 Person for Feb 2025. South Korea NR: Seoul: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data is updated monthly, averaging 7.000 Person from Jan 2018 (Median) to Mar 2025, with 87 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 18.000 Person in Feb 2021 and a record low of 2.000 Person in Jun 2020. South Korea NR: Seoul: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Korea. The data is categorized under Global Database’s South Korea – Table KR.G093: New Recruitment.

NR: Busan: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data was reported at 8.000 Person in Mar 2025. This records a decrease from the previous number of 20.000 Person for Feb 2025. NR: Busan: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data is updated monthly, averaging 6.000 Person from Jan 2018 (Median) to Mar 2025, with 87 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 25.000 Person in Jul 2024 and a record low of 0.000 Person in Apr 2020. NR: Busan: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Korea. The data is categorized under Global Database’s South Korea – Table KR.G093: New Recruitment.

South Korea NR: Gangwon: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data was reported at 2.000 Person in Mar 2025. This records a decrease from the previous number of 7.000 Person for Feb 2025. South Korea NR: Gangwon: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data is updated monthly, averaging 10.000 Person from Jan 2018 (Median) to Mar 2025, with 87 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 35.000 Person in Sep 2020 and a record low of 0.000 Person in Nov 2024. South Korea NR: Gangwon: ELWP: Police, Firemen, Prison data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Korea. The data is categorized under Global Database’s South Korea – Table KR.G093: New Recruitment.

Indonesia Import: Volume: Vans, not for Prison; with Only Electric Motor for Propulsion; Ckd data was reported at 0.001 kg mn in Jan 2024. This records an increase from the previous number of 0.000 kg mn for Oct 2022. Indonesia Import: Volume: Vans, not for Prison; with Only Electric Motor for Propulsion; Ckd data is updated monthly, averaging 0.001 kg mn from Jun 2019 (Median) to Jan 2024, with 7 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 0.003 kg mn in Jan 2020 and a record low of 0.000 kg mn in Oct 2022. Indonesia Import: Volume: Vans, not for Prison; with Only Electric Motor for Propulsion; Ckd data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Statistics Indonesia. The data is categorized under Indonesia Premium Database’s Foreign Trade – Table ID.JAH184: Foreign Trade: by HS 8 Digits: Import: HS87: Vehicles, Other Than Railway or Tramway Rolling Stock, and Parts and Accessories Thereof.

Turks and Caicos Islands saw a murder rate of ***** per 100,000 inhabitants, making it the most dangerous country for this kind of crime worldwide as of 2024. Interestingly, El Salvador, which long had the highest global homicide rates, has dropped out of the top 29 after a high number of gang members have been incarcerated. Meanwhile, Colima in Mexico was the most dangerous city for murders. Violent conflicts worldwide Notably, these figures do not include deaths that resulted from war or a violent conflict. While there is a persistent number of conflicts worldwide, resulting casualties are not considered murders. Partially due to this reason, homicide rates in Latin America are higher than those in Afghanistan or Syria. A different definition of murder in these circumstances could change the rate significantly in some countries. Causes of death Also, noteworthy is that murders are usually not random events. In the United States, the circumstances of murders are most commonly arguments, followed by narcotics incidents and robberies. Additionally, murders are not a leading cause of death. Heart diseases, strokes and cancer pose a greater threat to life than violent crime.

As of December 31, 2020, there were *** inmates in hard prison regime in Italy. Known in Italian as 41-bis from the law establishing its existence, hard prison regime comprises a number of preventive isolation measures. These measures have the purpose of severely restricting prisoners' interactions with the outside world. Hard prison regime is aimed especially at high-profile convicts belonging to organized crime or terrorist groups. The final goal is to prevent these people from leading and commanding new criminal activities from their confinement. According to the data, members of Camorra, Ndrangheta, and Cosa nostra made up for the largest part of 41-bis inmates. These are the three most powerful Mafia organizations in Italy, historically situated in the regions of Campania, Calabria, and Sicily, respectively.