Chicago's Homicide Rate Is Worst Among Big Cities

Well, at least in this list of big cities. It is even slightly worse than Killadelphia. Chicago Homicide Rate: 2026 Analysis

I knew things were bad, but I didn't realize they were this bad.

This report analyzes murder rates in Chicago, Cook County, Illinois, and other U.S. cities with high homicide rates.

Local databases and Chicago Police Department (CPD) press releases were used for city- and neighborhood-specific murder rates, which exclude justifiable homicides and involuntary manslaughter. The FBI’s Crime Data Explorer was used to extract homicide rates from cities across the U.S.

Chicago PD calculates murder rates that are different from the rates reported by the FBI. According the CPD, the 2025 murder rate in the city was 15.23 per 100,000 population.

But that means that to compare the CPD rates to the FBI rates would be ... problematic.

The following rates are from the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting Program. Click thru for the entire list of cities.

• New York City - Population 8.3 million - 3.92 homicides per 100,000
• Los Angeles - Population 3.8 million - 6.95 homicides per 100,000
• Chicago - Population 2.6 million - 17.47 per 100,000

There are more cities listed.

Although cities like Houston and Dallas also have double-digit homicide rates, Chicago is an outlier due to the combination of its large population and high homicide rate.

I always say that New York is 4 times the population of Chicago. I guess I will have to stop saying that. It is only about 3 times the population. NYC is roughly 300 square miles of land, (it has a significant amount of water) while Chicago has 227 square miles of land. So Chicago has only about ⅓ of NYC's population but ¾ as much land. NYC has more than double the population density of Chicago.

I would have guessed that would contribute to a higher crime rate, but NYC hasn't had as much incompetent leadership for as long as Chicago has. They seemed determined to correct that, but they are still running on the accomplishments of the past.

Hat tip to MaddMedic at Freedom Is Just Another Word…