US states by murders

California had the highest murders of 51 states in 2015, at 1,861. Vermont had the lowest, at 10. The median was 189 and the figure for the United States was 15,883. Source: the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program.

Highest1,861California

Lowest10Vermont

Median18951 states

United States15,883History

Map of states, 2015

Under 30
30 to 110
110 to 190
190 to 370
370 to 530
530 and over

count, 2015. Source: FBI, FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter. Boundaries: U.S. Census Bureau cartographic boundary files.

All states, 2015

count. Source: FBI, FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter. Retrieved 2026-10-18.

Full ranking

Rank	States	2015 count	Change on 2014
1	California	1,861	+9.5%
2	Texas	1,317	+10.5%
3	Florida	1,041	+6%
4	Illinois	754	+9.3%
5	Pennsylvania	665	+9%
6	Georgia	622	+2.5%
7	New York	613	-0.5%
8	Michigan	585	+7.5%
9	Maryland	538	+48.6%
10	Ohio	522	+12.5%
11	North Carolina	517	+3.8%
12	Missouri	503	+24.5%
13	Louisiana	492	+3.4%
14	Tennessee	418	+13.3%
15	South Carolina	407	+26.4%
16	Virginia	390	+11.4%
17	Indiana	370	+11.1%
18	New Jersey	363	+3.1%
19	Alabama	348	+26.1%
20	Arizona	306	-1.6%
21	Mississippi	253	-2.3%
22	Oklahoma	240	+33.3%
22	Wisconsin	240	+50.9%
24	Kentucky	219	+33.5%
25	Washington	218	+22.5%
26	Arkansas	189	+8%
27	Nevada	178	+4.7%
28	Colorado	173	+15.3%
29	District of Columbia	162	+54.3%
30	Minnesota	133	+51.1%
31	Massachusetts	131	-1.5%
32	Kansas	126	+37%
33	New Mexico	117	+15.8%
34	Connecticut	116	+30.3%
35	Oregon	110	+31%
36	West Virginia	85	+1.2%
37	Iowa	73	+21.7%
38	Delaware	62	+24%
38	Nebraska	62	+17%
40	Alaska	59	+43.9%
41	Utah	57	-13.6%
42	Montana	38	0%
43	South Dakota	33	+43.5%
44	Idaho	32	0%
45	Rhode Island	31	+19.2%
46	Maine	23	+9.5%
47	North Dakota	21	-8.7%
48	Hawaii	19	-5%
49	Wyoming	16	0%
50	New Hampshire	15	-6.3%
51	Vermont	10	0%

Other periods

About this ranking

Estimated number of murders and nonnegligent manslaughters known to law enforcement. FBI Uniform Crime Reporting Program.

UCR definition: the willful killing of one human being by another, excluding deaths caused by negligence, suicides, accidents and justifiable homicides. For other countries use homicide_rate (UNODC). FBI estimates for the whole population: agencies that did not report, or reported part of the year, are filled in by the FBI. The FBI revises earlier years in each annual release, and from 2021 the estimates are built from incident-based (NIBRS) reports. The national series has no values for 2017 to 2020 in the FBI estimates file.

Every value in the ranking comes from the same publisher and the same period, so the states are compared on one definition. Equal values share a rank.

How to cite

Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program, Crime Data Explorer. FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter. https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/downloads. Retrieved 2026-10-18.

Citation styles

The publisher is the author. Invokely is named only as the place the figures were read, where a style asks for it.

APA 7

Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program. (2026). FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter (US states by murders, 2015) [Data set]. Retrieved October 18, 2026, from https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/downloads

MLA 9

FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, US states by murders, 2015. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program, 14 Aug. 2026, https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/downloads. Invokely, https://invokely.ai/rankings/murders/us-states?period=2015. Accessed 18 Oct. 2026.

Chicago (author-date)

Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program. 2026. FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter. US states by murders, 2015. Dataset. Accessed October 18, 2026. https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/downloads. Also distributed by Invokely, https://invokely.ai/rankings/murders/us-states?period=2015.

Harvard

Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program (2026) FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, US states by murders, 2015 [Dataset]. Available at: https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/downloads, via Invokely: https://invokely.ai/rankings/murders/us-states?period=2015 (Accessed: 18 October 2026).

BibTeX

@misc{federal_us_states_by_murders_2015,
  author = {{Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program}},
  title = {{FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter: US states by murders, 2015}},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {Data set},
  url = {https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/downloads},
  urldate = {2026-10-18},
  note = {Accessed via Invokely, https://invokely.ai/rankings/murders/us-states?period=2015. Publisher attribution: Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program, Crime Data Explorer. FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter. https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/\#/pages/downloads. Retrieved 2026-10-18.},
}

RIS

TY  - DATA
AU  - Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program
TI  - FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter: US states by murders, 2015
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/08/14
PB  - Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program
DB  - Invokely
UR  - https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/downloads
L2  - https://invokely.ai/rankings/murders/us-states?period=2015
Y2  - 2026/10/18
N1  - Accessed via Invokely, https://invokely.ai/rankings/murders/us-states?period=2015.
N1  - Publisher attribution: Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program, Crime Data Explorer. FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter. https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/downloads. Retrieved 2026-10-18.
ER  -

Embed this chart

Paste this code into a web page or a blog post. The chart shows the latest figures as they are published, with the source and a link back to this page.

Embed code

<iframe src="https://invokely.ai/embed/rankings/murders/us-states?period=2015" width="760" height="500" title="US states by murders, 2015, chart from Invokely" loading="lazy" style="border:0;width:100%;max-width:760px" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin"></iframe>

Sites that read oEmbed links, such as WordPress, can show the chart when you paste the link to this page.

Use this data in your AI agent

Invokely serves this figure to AI assistants through MCP and to code through a REST API, with the source and citation attached. Ask your assistant:

Rank US states by murders using official data, and cite the source.

rank_places {"indicator":"murders","level":"region","within":"United States","limit":10}
GET https://invokely.ai/api/v1/rank?indicator=murders&level=region&within=United%20States&limit=10

Connect Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor in one step. The trial answers 25 calls a day without an account.

Questions

Which state has the highest murders?

California, with 1,861 in 2015, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program.

Which state has the lowest murders?

Vermont, with 10 in 2015.

Where does this ranking come from?

Every value comes from one source and one period, so the places are comparable: Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program, FBI UCR Summary Reporting System estimated crimes, 1979 on: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter. Retrieved 2026-10-18.