659,880 vehicles were reported stolen in the United States in 2025, about one every 48 seconds, and 190,828 fewer than the year before. The FBI's own estimate lands close by, at 673,466, and puts the theft rate at its lowest in 20 years. Below: which states and cities lead, which models thieves take, what a theft costs, and how two official counts can differ.
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The National Insurance Crime Bureau counted 659,880 vehicles reported stolen in 2025, down from 850,708 in 2024. That is 190,828 fewer thefts. NICB’s release describes the fall as a 23.2% decline; its own two counts work out to 22.4%. In NICB’s words it is “a historic low figure for U.S. vehicle thefts and a clear signal of the end of the pandemic-fueled surge.” (NICB, March 18, 2026; NICB, July 15, 2026)
The FBI estimates the same year independently from crimes reported to police: 673,466 motor vehicle thefts in 2025, down 22.7% from 2024, at a rate of 197.0 per 100,000 people. The FBI adds that this was the lowest rate in 20 years, and a 38.8% fall from 2023, which had the highest rate since 2007. (FBI, Reported Crimes in the Nation 2025; FBI, UCR Summary 2025)
Even at the low, NICB notes that one vehicle is still stolen every 48 seconds, which is about 75 an hour or roughly 1,800 a day. Motor vehicle theft was 12.8% of all property crime the FBI counted in 2025, second only to larceny-theft (74.5%) and just ahead of burglary (12.6%).
NICB and the FBI measure different things, so their totals never match exactly:
For 2025 the two land within about 2% of each other (659,880 and 673,466), and both show a fall of a little over a fifth. The FBI also revised its 2024 figure after publication, from 880,327 to 870,686; the 22.7% comparison above uses the revised number.
Rates per 100,000 people, from the FBI’s 2025 state table (Crime in the United States 2025, Table 5). The U.S. rate was 197.0. (FBI Crime Data Explorer, CIUS 2025 downloads)
| Highest rates | Per 100,000 | Lowest rates | Per 100,000 |
|---|---|---|---|
| District of Columbia | 673.8 | Vermont | 47.8 |
| Nevada | 396.5 | Idaho | 52.6 |
| New Mexico | 320.9 | New Hampshire | 53.3 |
| California | 316.7 | Maine | 59.3 |
| Maryland | 315.6 | West Virginia | 66.2 |
By raw count the order changes, because big states steal more cars in total. NICB’s top five by volume in 2025: California 136,988 (more than a fifth of the national total), Texas 75,269, Illinois 28,327, Florida 27,142 and New York 24,206.
Two outliers from the FBI’s year-on-year table: Alaska was the only state where thefts rose in 2025 (up 12.8%, from 1,822 to 2,056), and Washington fell the most (down 40.2%, from 34,669 to 20,724).
Theft is heavily regional. The FBI’s 2025 rates per 100,000 people by region:
| Region | Thefts in 2025 | Per 100,000 |
|---|---|---|
| West | 219,824 | 274.3 |
| Midwest | 132,683 | 190.2 |
| South | 241,864 | 180.7 |
| Northeast | 79,095 | 136.3 |
And by where people live: 214.8 per 100,000 in metropolitan areas, 103.6 in cities outside metro areas, and 72.0 in nonmetropolitan counties. The metro rate is roughly three times the rate in rural counties.
More than one-third of all 2025 thefts happened in just ten metro areas, according to NICB. The five largest by count:
| Metro area | Vehicles stolen, 2025 |
|---|---|
| Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA | 53,911 |
| New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ | 27,138 |
| Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN | 24,299 |
| Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands, TX | 23,659 |
| San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA | 22,197 |
Adjusted for population, among metro areas with more than 1,000 thefts, the highest rates were San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont at 477.51 per 100,000 people, Bakersfield-Delano at 477.27, and Memphis at 427.75. (NICB, March 18, 2026)
NICB’s top ten by make and model, counting every model year together:
| # | Vehicle | Thefts, 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hyundai Elantra | 21,732 |
| 2 | Honda Accord | 17,797 |
| 3 | Hyundai Sonata | 17,687 |
| 4 | Chevrolet Silverado 1500 | 16,764 |
| 5 | Honda Civic | 12,725 |
| 6 | Kia Optima | 11,521 |
| 7 | Ford F-150 | 10,102 |
| 8 | Toyota Camry | 9,833 |
| 9 | Honda CR-V | 9,809 |
| 10 | Nissan Altima | 8,445 |
These are totals, not rates. Common models appear partly because there are so many of them on the road; a rarer car can be stolen far more often per vehicle and still not make this list.
The Hyundai and Kia wave traced back to a missing part. Passive immobilizers, which stop an engine starting without the right key, were standard on only 26% of 2015 Hyundai and Kia vehicle series, against 96% for all other manufacturers combined, according to the Highway Loss Data Institute (HLDI Bulletin Vol. 42, No. 7, May 2025).
The share is falling. Hyundai and Kia accounted for 21% of all U.S. vehicle thefts in 2023, 16% in 2024 and 14% in 2025 (NICB). The anti-theft software upgrade helped: HLDI found theft claims of all kinds were 46% lower, and whole-vehicle theft claims 52% less frequent, for eligible cars that got it. But by December 2024 only 41% of eligible Hyundais and 40% of eligible Kias had the upgrade, and theft claim frequencies for the 2011-22 models were still near 11 (Hyundai) and 10 (Kia) per 1,000 insured vehicle years, against fewer than 2 for all 2011-22 vehicles (IIHS, August 7, 2025).
Thieves also take parts. NICB’s insurance-claim data showed catalytic converter thefts climbing from 16,660 claims in 2020 to 64,701 in 2022, with replacement costing $1,000 to $3,500 or more depending on the vehicle (NICB, May 10, 2023). NICB has not published a count on its own site for any year after 2022, so we do not quote one. If yours was taken, see catalytic converter stolen: fix it or sell?
NICB counted 58,957 recreational vehicles stolen in 2025, down 20%, including 44,564 motorcycles, of which 41% were eventually recovered. About 63% of stolen recreational vehicles were never recovered (NICB, August 3, 2026).
On offenders, the FBI’s five-year special report found 77.7% of known offenders were male and 22.3% female, but the offender’s sex was not known at all in 67% of cases (FBI, Motor Vehicle Theft, 2019 to 2023).
Every figure above is taken from the agency that produced it: the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting program (2025 data, released August 2026), the National Insurance Crime Bureau, and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s Highway Loss Data Institute. Nothing is rounded from a news story or a summary site.
One access note, so you can check our work: nicb.org refuses automated requests, so each NICB figure was read from the Internet Archive’s capture of NICB’s own release page (the March 2026 report as captured September 16, 2026). The FBI state, region and value figures come from the Crime in the United States 2025 tables on the FBI Crime Data Explorer download page. Numbers are as of September 2026 and will change when the 2026 data is published.
659,880 vehicles were reported stolen in 2025, according to the National Insurance Crime Bureau, down from 850,708 in 2024. The FBI's separate estimate for 2025 is 673,466, a rate of 197.0 per 100,000 people and the lowest in 20 years.
The Hyundai Elantra, with 21,732 thefts in 2025, followed by the Honda Accord (17,797) and Hyundai Sonata (17,687). These are NICB counts across all model years.
California has the most by count, 136,988 in 2025. By rate, the District of Columbia is highest at 673.8 per 100,000 people, followed by Nevada, New Mexico, California and Maryland. Vermont has the lowest rate, 47.8.
Many lacked a passive immobilizer: only 26% of 2015 Hyundai and Kia series had one as standard, against 96% for other makers. A software upgrade cut theft claims by 46% for cars that got it, and the brands' share of thefts fell from 21% in 2023 to 14% in 2025.
Law enforcement agencies reporting to the FBI recovered 44.2% of the value of locally stolen vehicles in 2025. For motorcycles, NICB says 41% of those stolen in 2025 were recovered.