Preliminary figures released Oct. 26 by the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) show serious violent victimization fell 25% in 2025, while the broader measure including simple assault showed no statistically significant change.
The serious-violence rate declined from 9.9 to 7.4 victimizations per 1,000 U.S. residents age 12 or older between the 2024 and 2025 survey years. The category covers rape or sexual assault, robbery and aggravated assault. Within it, the aggravated-assault rate fell 31%, from 4.5 to 3.1 per 1,000.
The rate for all violent victimization, which also includes simple assault, moved from 28.7 to 25.7 per 1,000. BJS did not find that decrease statistically significant. It estimated 7,496,300 violent victimizations in 2025. That figure counts experiences of crime, not distinct victims or incidents: one incident can affect multiple people, and a person can be victimized more than once.
Household property victimization fell 19%, from 138.0 to 111.2 per 1,000 households. BJS estimated 14,887,570 property victimizations for the survey year.
The victimization survey includes crimes whether or not they were reported to police, but excludes homicide. A separate BJS measure based on reports to law enforcement showed an 11% fall in the violent-offense rate, from 376.1 per 100,000 people in 2024 to 335.2 in 2025. The two measures cover different sets of crimes.
Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward credited President Trump’s crime agenda for the decline in a Justice Department statement. The BJS victimization report does not establish what caused the change.
Both years in the survey comparison use a redesigned questionnaire. BJS introduced it alongside the previous version in 2024 and switched to it fully in January 2025; results from the two versions are not comparable. The agency adjusted the 2025 survey weights to account for interviews missed in October and November during a lapse in federal appropriations. Final 2025 estimates are due in 2027.
