Crime in England and Wales: Latest numbers and trends

The latest crime figures for England and Wales show police-recorded homicides at a historic low and knife offences falling, though shoplifting remains close to record levels.

Here the PA news agency looks at the latest crime numbers and trends, which have been released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

– Homicides

Police forces in England and Wales recorded 518 homicides in the year to June, down 6% from 552 in the previous year.

It is the lowest figure since current police recording practices began in 2002/03.

The homicide rate stood at 8.4 per million people in the year to June, down from 9.2 in the previous 12 months.

This is the lowest rate since the 1970s, according to the Home Office.

Knives or sharp instruments were used in 38% of homicides, down year on year from 43%.

– Knife crime

Some 51,527 knife crime offences were recorded by forces in England and Wales in the 12 months to June.

This is down year on year by 5% from 54,215 and is 7% below the pre-pandemic figure of 55,170 offences in 2019/20.

Knife-enabled homicides stood at 196 in the year to June, down 18% from 239 in the previous 12 months.

The number of offences classed as knife-enabled threats to kill has risen by 7% year on year from 5,719 to 6,126.

Both of these figures are higher than before the pandemic (4,935 in 2019/20).

The number of offences classed as “possession of an article with a blade or point” stood at 28,499, up 3% year on year from 27,760 and higher than the pre-pandemic figure of 23,265 in 2019/20.

– Shoplifting

There were 529,994 shoplifting offences recorded by forces in England and Wales in the year to June.

This is up 13% from 469,698 in the previous year.

It is not quite the highest figure for a 12-month period; a slightly higher total of 530,439 offences was recorded in the year to March 2025.

– Theft from the person

Offences involving theft from the person are also close to record levels.

Some 145,860 of these offences were recorded by forces in the year to June, up 5% from 139,234 in the previous 12 months.

The highest figure for a 12-month period is 151,115, in the year to March 2025.

– Violence against the person

A total of 1.9 million offences classed as “violence against the person” were recorded by police in England and Wales in the year to June, down 2% from 2.0 million the previous year but above the pre-pandemic figure of 1.8 million in 2019/20.

– Total police recorded crime

Police forces recorded a total of 6.6 million crimes in England and Wales in the year to June, down by 1% from 6.7 million in the previous 12 months.

The figure is up from 6.1 million in the pre-pandemic year of 2019/20, and from 4.2 million a decade earlier in 2014/15.

While some of this increase “may reflect genuine changes in trends in crimes reported to and recorded by police”, the rise is “largely influenced by improvements in recording standards”, the ONS said.

As such, police-recorded crime “is not generally considered a reliable indicator of overall crime trends”.

– Overall experiences of crime

Separate figures from the ONS Crime Survey for England and Wales suggest people aged 16 and over experienced 9.3 million incidents of crime in the year to June 2025, up slightly from 9.2 million in the previous 12 months.

The main driver of the rise was a 14% rise in fraud, which accounts for an estimated 4.1 million incidents, including 2.5 million incidents of bank and credit account fraud.

The overall total of 9.3 million incidents in 2024/25 is 17% lower than the 11.2 million for 2016/17, when fraud and computer misuse were first included.

The survey “provides a reliable measure of crime trends for the population, and the offence types it covers” because it is not affected by police reporting or recording changes, the ONS said.

It covers a range of personal and household victim-based crime, including theft, robbery, criminal damage, fraud, computer misuse and violence with or without injury, but does not include sexual offences, stalking, harassment and domestic abuse, which are presented separately.

Experiences of theft, criminal damage and violence with or without injury, as measured by the ONS survey, have been on a broad downwards trend since the mid-1990s.