Crime Data Explorer

In Detail

The Crime Data Explorer (CDE) is the FBI's interactive, public-facing platform for accessing Uniform Crime Reporting data. Launched to improve transparency and public access to crime statistics, the CDE provides downloadable datasets, interactive charts, and an API for programmatic access. It replaces the older method of publishing static PDF reports with a dynamic, queryable system. The CDE offers data at national, state, and agency (local police department) levels for various crime types, covering multiple years of historical data. Users can explore trends over time, compare jurisdictions, and download raw datasets for their own analysis. CrimeContext sources its data from the CDE API, processing the raw agency-level data into city-level per-capita rates, trend calculations, and Safety Context Scores. The CDE API provides endpoints for offense data, arrest data, police employee data, and other statistics by agency, state, or national level. While the CDE is a powerful tool, it requires some expertise to use effectively — the data comes in raw form without the contextual framing that CrimeContext adds (per-capita normalization, national average comparisons, trend analysis, and safety grading). The CDE is maintained by the FBI's Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) division, the same entity responsible for the overall UCR program. It represents a significant step toward making government crime data more accessible to the general public, researchers, journalists, and policymakers. Users should be aware that CDE data typically has a 1-2 year lag from the current date, as the FBI must collect, validate, and process submissions from thousands of agencies before publishing.