OTTAWA — The gap between Canada and the United States on police-reported violent crime has narrowed in recent years, driven by a rise in the rate of major assaults here.
A Statistics Canada analysis of crime trends between 1998 and 2023 says the number of police-reported violent crimes for every 100,000 people continues to be higher in the United States than in Canada.
But while the rate of police-reported violent crimes in the U.S. dropped 37 per cent over the 25-year period, the report says the rate of violent crimes reported in Canada increased 13 per cent from 1998 to 2008, and by nine per cent from 2009 to 2023.
The report says homicide remains more common in the United States than in Canada, mainly because of a higher rate of firearm-related homicides.
In 2023, there were 5.7 homicides per 100,000 people in the United States, three times the rate recorded in Canada, the report says.
“Most of the current and historical differences in rates between the two countries can be attributed to firearm-related homicides,” the report says. It notes that in 2023, 76 per cent of all homicides committed in the U.S. involved a firearm, compared with 38 per cent in Canada.
“Without exception, homicides involving firearms have been consistently much higher in the United States than in Canada,” the report says.
Statistics Canada says the same can’t be said for homicides committed with other weapons or with physical force. It says that over the 25 year period examined, the U.S. rate of non-firearm homicides was only slightly higher than Canada’s rate.
Looking at overall trends in homicides, the report says there have been “notable similarities” between both countries dating back to the 1970s.
It says homicide rates in Canada and the United States climbed steadily in the 1970s, peaking in 1975 in Canada and in 1980 in the United States.
Since then, the report says, both countries have seen “considerable declines” in long-term trends. In 2023, Canada’s homicide rate was 33 per cent lower than the 1975 peak, while in the United States the 2023 rate was 44 per cent lower than when the rate peaked there in 1980.
“Despite these long-term decreases, both countries have also seen recent upticks in their annual homicide rates,” the report says.
The 2023 homicide rate in Canada was six per cent higher than it was five years earlier, and 35 per cent higher than it was 10 years prior. The 2023 rate in the United States was 11 per cent higher than in 2019 and 26 per cent higher than in 2013.
The rate of police-reported major assaults has increased in Canada and dropped in the United States, the report says.
“Since the late 1990s, rates of major assault have been generally trending in opposite directions in Canada and the United States,” the report says, adding that most of the decrease in the United States happened from 1998 to 2013.
“Most recently, trends in major assault in the two countries have looked more similar.”
The report says police-reported crime trends in Canada and the United States have followed similar paths since the 1960s and that both countries have recorded downward trends in four offences: robbery, break and enter, motor vehicle theft and theft.
As with violent crime, the report says the gap in property crime rates between the two countries has “all but disappeared” in the last few years.
It says that in 2023, the property crime rate in Canada was slightly higher than the recorded rate for the United States, consistent with the pattern in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
The report says the rate of property crime in Canada was substantially lower than in the U.S. between 2010 and 2015, but the rates have converged since then.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 9, 2025.
Catherine Morrison, The Canadian Press
