NJ Violent Crime Has Been Dropping For Decades, FBI Data Shows

Violent crime dropped nearly 12 percent in New Jersey last year, and has plunged a whopping 70 percent since its peak in the 1990s, new data shows.

The FBI recently released nationwide Uniform Crime Reporting statistics for 1979 to 2025, which can be seen online here.

New Jersey had a population of 9,548,215 people and saw 18,508 violent crimes last year. This was down from 20,876 violent crimes in 2024.

The state’s violent crime rate dropped from 219.7 crimes per 100,000 in 2024, to 193.8 crimes per 100,000 people in 2025: an 11.8 percent decrease.

Violent crime in New Jersey remains significantly below national levels.

The United States saw 327.6 crimes per 100,000 people in 2025 – which is also at historically low levels, officials say.

According to the FBI, the nation’s violent crime rate fell 9.3 percent last year, marking the largest year-to-year decline since the agency began estimating crime trends in 1936.

FBI director Kash Patel said the latest decline is a result of law enforcement agencies working together across jurisdictions.

“You’re talking rape, robbery, assault… all down double-digits across America,” Patel said.

Several of New Jersey’s largest cities have been reporting major milestones in their battle against violent crime.

Newark – the most populated city in the state – has seen the largest nationwide drop in homicides so far this year as per the Major Cities Chiefs Association, whose numbers have been cited by the White House. Another large North Jersey municipality, Jersey City, reported a 40 percent drop in homicides and a 45 percent decrease in shootings last year.

In South Jersey, the Camden County Police Department announced that total crime was down 13 percent through the first six months of 2025. Meanwhile, violent crime declined by another 12 percent over same time last year, making it one of the best statistical half year totals in the last half-century, authorities said.

• Related: 2 Largest Cities In NJ Are Seeing Big Drops In Murders, Shootings

THE LONG HAUL

It’s not a new trend, the FBI data shows: violent crime has been steadily dropping across the Garden State and the rest of the nation since the early 1990s.

New Jersey’s violent crime rate peaked in 1990, when the state had a population of 7,730,188 people and saw 50,057 violent crimes: a rate of 647.6 per 100,000 people.

Meanwhile, the national violent crime rate peaked in 1991. The United States had a population of 252,153,092 that year and saw 1,911,767 crimes: a rate of 758.2 per 100,000 people.

View a searchable table of crime data by state below (the graph can also be seen online here):

CRIME AND PUBLIC PERCEPTION

According to a recent study from the Pew Research Center, many Americans tend to believe crime is up – even when official data shows it is down.

In 23 of 27 Gallup surveys conducted since 1993, at least 60 percent of U.S. adults have said there is more crime nationally than there was the year before, despite the downward trend in crime rates during most of that period.

Public attitudes about crime differ widely by party affiliation, race, ethnicity and other factors, the center reported.

“For example, Republicans and Republican-leaning independents are much more likely than Democrats and Democratic leaners to say reducing crime should be a top priority for the president and Congress (68% vs. 47%),” researchers said.

A Rutgers-Eagleton poll found similar numbers, with Republicans (52 percent) more likely to say they are worried about being a victim of a crime than independents (41 percent) and Democrats (32 percent).

Overall, 57 percent of New Jerseyans said crime has stayed the same in their neighborhood as compared to five years ago, 10 percent said it has gotten better, and 30 percent said it has gotten worse.

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