Which US cities showed the largest year-over-year increase in homicides from 2023 to 2024?
Executive summary
Available reporting shows that most major studies and city samples found homicides fell from 2023 to 2024 across many U.S. cities, but some smaller samples and working papers identify particular cities with year‑over‑year increases; for example, a working paper that compares 24 cities reports Indianapolis had the second‑largest rate increase of 24.0% from 2023 to 2024 [1]. National multi‑city studies from the Council on Criminal Justice found homicides were broadly lower in 2024 versus 2023—16% fewer homicides across 29 study cities, representing 631 fewer deaths [2].
1. What the headline numbers show: broad declines in 2024, but some local increases
The Council on Criminal Justice’s year‑end 2024 analysis reports that reported homicides in the 29 study cities fell 16% from 2023 to 2024, a net drop of 631 homicides, and that most violent offenses were lower in 2024 than in 2023 [2]. Brookings likewise documents a large decline that began in 2023 and continued into 2024, saying the national homicide rate was on track to return toward 2019 levels [3]. Those aggregate findings mean that nationwide increases from 2023 to 2024 were not the dominant pattern; instead, declines were the headline story [2] [3].
2. Where the reporting finds notable year‑over‑year increases
Not all city‑level reports follow the national trend. A working paper that compiles 2024 homicide statistics for 24 U.S. cities identifies Indianapolis as experiencing the second‑largest year‑to‑year homicide rate increase—24.0% from 2023 to 2024—and notes two other cities in that sample had increases of about 23.6% and 21.2% [1]. Newsweek’s mapping piece reported that Arlington, Texas, saw a 7% increase in homicides from 2023 to 2024 in its selected comparisons [4]. These findings show increases can be large in particular places even as aggregate totals fall [1] [4].
3. Differences in samples, methods and what they capture
Studies differ by which cities they include and how they measure change. The CPSI working paper on 24 cities uses the FBI’s Crime Data Explorer for 2023 and local sources for 2024 and reports percent changes in per‑capita rates [1]. The Council on Criminal Justice uses a 29‑city sample and compiles municipal reporting with attention to which cities posted full data; it cautions that not all jurisdictions report every month and that figures are subject to revision [2]. WalletHub‑derived summaries and other rankings (cited by Police1) rely on quarter‑by‑quarter comparisons or different time windows; that produces different “top increases” depending on the metric [5]. Those methodological differences explain why different pieces spotlight different cities [1] [5] [2].
4. Scale matters: percent change vs. absolute counts
Percent increases (for example, Indianapolis’s 24.0% rate rise in the 24‑city paper) can overstate practical impact when base counts are small, while large absolute changes in cities with high totals drive national trends. The Council on Criminal Justice emphasizes aggregate counts—631 fewer homicides across its 29 cities in 2024—underscoring that absolute reductions mattered even as some places saw percent increases [2]. The working paper’s focus on rates per 100,000 highlights relative risk differences across differently sized cities [1].
5. Competing explanations and context offered by analysts
Analysts disagree about causes. The Council on Criminal Justice and Brookings point to pandemic‑era disruptions, labor and schooling effects, policing and court backlogs, and social supports as plausible contributors to the earlier spike and subsequent declines; Brookings frames the 2023–24 drop as a return toward pre‑pandemic patterns [6] [3]. Local increases (e.g., Indianapolis or Arlington in the samples cited) do not receive a universally agreed single explanation in these sources; the working paper lists increases but focuses on comparative ranking rather than causal attribution [1].
6. What these sources do not settle and how to interpret them
Available sources do not provide a definitive national list of the “largest year‑over‑year increases” for every U.S. city; rather, they offer differing city samples and methodologies that produce different top‑increase lists [1] [4] [2]. To identify the largest increases for a wider population of cities would require harmonized counts and consistent population adjustments across jurisdictions—something these reports note as a limitation [1] [2]. Policymakers and reporters should treat single‑city percent jumps as signals meriting local investigation, not proof of a nationwide reversal.
Bottom line: most high‑quality multi‑city reporting finds homicides fell from 2023 to 2024 across many sampled cities [2] [3], but focused samples and working papers identify specific places—such as Indianapolis (24.0% increase in the 24‑city working paper) and Arlington (7% in Newsweek’s map)—that bucked the broader decline and warrant closer local scrutiny [1] [4].