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Fact check: Which US cities have seen the largest increase in murders from 2024 to 2025?
Executive Summary
The best available mid‑2025 data show that overall homicides fell about 17% in the first half of 2025 versus the same period in 2024 across a set of 30 reporting cities, while a small number of individual cities experienced sharp increases, with Little Rock reported as the largest single increase at +39% and Milwaukee among the smaller increases at +6% [1] [2]. Important caveats limit definitive claims about “which cities saw the largest increases” for the full year: the data sets are partial, cover different city samples and time windows, and earlier separate analyses identified other cities with large year‑to‑year jumps for different periods (e.g., Colorado Springs, Lexington) [3] [4].
1. Why the headline numbers say crime is down — and why some cities buck that trend
Nationally aggregated mid‑year reporting from a prominent crime‑tracking group found a 17% drop in homicides in the first half of 2025 vs. the first half of 2024, based on 30 cities that submitted mid‑year data; that same compilation notes that five of those cities saw increases, with Little Rock highest at +39% and Milwaukee at +6% [1] [2]. The dataset covered only cities that reported comparable mid‑year figures and thus is not a census of all U.S. cities; the headline decline reflects aggregated counts across participating cities, not a uniform decline everywhere, and the identified increases highlight local deviations from the national pattern [1].
2. Different reports point to different “largest increases” because of time windows and city samples
Separate analyses and earlier year‑over‑year reports point to other large increases when measured across different periods: a study found Colorado Springs up 56% from 2023 to 2024, and other local analyses highlighted Lexington and Indianapolis as having substantial percentage rises in that 2023–2024 span (Lexington +30.2%, Indianapolis +24%) [3] [4]. These figures do not contradict the mid‑2025 mid‑year decline; they instead illustrate that which city shows the largest increase depends strongly on the chosen baseline year and which months or full years are compared, and on whether the metric is raw counts or rates per 100,000 residents [3] [4].
3. Rate vs. count: measurement choices change the ranking of “worst increases”
Some outlets report murder rates per 100,000 residents (useful for size‑adjusted comparisons), while others report raw count changes (which can exaggerate percent swings in smaller cities). For example, 2024 rankings of highest murder rates list Jackson, MS, at the top on a per‑capita basis, and that same report notes substantial year‑to‑year drops in certain high‑rate cities in early 2025 (Jackson −50%, St. Louis −28% in Q1 2025), demonstrating that a city with a high rate in one year can still show large declines or increases in counts the next year depending on local dynamics [5] [6]. The choice of metric materially alters which cities appear to have the “largest increase,” so any claim must state whether it refers to counts or rates [5].
4. Data limitations: partial reporting, mid‑year snapshots, and timing lags
The mid‑2025 compilation covers only a subset of cities that provided comparable first‑half data; comprehensive final tallies traditionally come later from national systems like the FBI’s UCR/NIBRS or the Bureau of Justice Statistics’ NCVS, which will provide fuller year‑to‑year comparability but arrive with months of delay. Media reports and think‑tank updates are timely but not uniform in methodology; some explicitly analyze 24 cities or 30 cities only, and others focus on quarterly spikes. Because of these constraints, the claim “which U.S. cities have seen the largest increase from 2024 to 2025” cannot be definitively answered with the current partial datasets without specifying the reporting universe and time window [1] [4].
5. Why politics and local reporting matter — and how agendas shape framing
Different outlets emphasize different angles: neutral research organizations frame percentage changes and sampling caveats, local news focuses on city‑level spikes to press for policy responses, and political actors may spotlight isolated increases to argue broader narratives about law and order. Readers should note the potential for selective presentation — citing a single city’s large percentage increase (especially in a small city) can be persuasive but misleading if the broader dataset shows a national decline. Cross‑checking local police data, regional trends, and national compilations is essential to avoid conflating tactical anecdotes with systemic change [2] [5].
6. Bottom line and what to watch for next
As of the latest mid‑2025 updates, Little Rock is the single city most widely reported to have the largest increase among the subset tracked (+39%), with Milwaukee among smaller increases, while other cities (Colorado Springs, Lexington) showed large increases in earlier 2023–2024 comparisons [1] [3] [4]. To settle full‑year comparisons for 2024→2025, wait for consistent, full‑year submissions from national reporting systems and triangulate those with city‑level annual reports; until then, any definitive ranking should be labeled provisional and transparent about the cities covered and the metric used [1] [4].