FBI reports record decrease in violent crime in 2025

Statistics released Friday by the FBI showed record decreases last year in both the national estimated violent crime rate and the estimated rate for murders and certain manslaughters.

According to the FBI Uniform Crime Report, the overall amount of violent crime declined by over 9% from 2024. The rate of murder and nonnegligent manslaughter — willful killings that were not pre-planned — fell by over 18%.

Those are the largest year-to-year decreases in both categories since the FBI introduced the data-based estimations in 1936, the report said.

President Donald Trump touted those statistics in remarks before law enforcement officers in Garden City, New York, saying the “numbers are the best numbers anybody’s ever seen on crime.”

“We achieved the single largest reduction in violent crime in American history. It’s pretty amazing,” Trump said.

FBI Director Kash Patel said in the introduction to the report that the 2025 murder rate of 4.1 per 100,000 inhabitants “is tied with 1955 and 1956 for the lowest rate since FBI estimations began.”

There were an estimated 1,119,768 violent crimes in 2025 and 14,085 murders, the report said.

Both the violent crime and murder rates have decreased annually since spiking in 2022. The violent crime rate fell by 4.5 % in 2024, while murder and nonnegligent manslaughter decreased by 14.9%.

“Preliminary trends for 2026 are showing additional decreases in crime,” Patel noted in the report.

The analysis includes data from more than 17,000 law enforcement agencies, and every city with a population of over one million contributed a full year’s worth of data, the report said.

The data showed other promising trends as well. Reported rapes decreased by 7.6% from 2024, while robbery decreased by 18.5% and aggravated assault fell by 7.5%.

Property crimes also decreased, according to the report. They were down an overall 12.4%, with burglaries decreasing by 15.8% and motor vehicle theft down an estimated 22%.

Not all of the data was positive. The analysis found that reported assaults on law enforcement officers had increased by 13.8%. In all, there were 90,178 officers assaulted in the line of duty, a 10-year high, according to the report.

Michael Kosnar Michael Kosnar is the Justice Department Producer for NBC News.