UK Knife Crime Statistics

Police recorded 48,774 knife or sharp instrument offences in England and Wales in the year ending March 2026. That is 8% fewer than the 53,096 recorded the year before^[1]. This page reports the latest official figures on knife crime from the bodies that collect them: the Office for National Statistics, the Ministry of Justice, the Home Office, NHS England, the Scottish Government and the Police Service of Northern Ireland. Every figure states its period, its geography and its source. None of them are combined into a single UK-wide total. The four nations record knife crime under different rules.

Key figures at a glance

Figure	Period	Geography	Source
Police recorded knife or sharp instrument offences: 48,774 (down 8%)	YE March 2026	England & Wales	ONS[1]
Homicides by knife or sharp instrument: 205 (down 21%)	YE March 2025	England & Wales	ONS[2]
Most common weapon in these homicides: kitchen knife, 95 cases	YE March 2025	England & Wales	ONS[2]
Teenage (13 to 19) homicides involving a knife: 65%, versus 39% of all homicides	YE March 2025	England & Wales	ONS[2]
Knife and offensive weapon disposals: 20,885	YE March 2026	England & Wales	MoJ[3]
Custody rate for these disposals: 30.9% (down from 33.4%)	YE March 2026	England & Wales	MoJ[3]
Offenders aged 10 to 17: 15.9% of disposals (3,324)	YE March 2026	England & Wales	MoJ[3]
Stop and search for offensive weapons: find rate 12.3%, searches down 8.7%	YE March 2025	England & Wales	Home Office[4]
NHS hospital admissions for assault by sharp object: 3,337 (down 5%)	YE March 2026	England	NHS England, via ONS[1]
Handling offensive weapons crimes: 11,249	2024/25	Scotland	Scottish Government[5]
Selected violent and sexual offences involving a knife or sharp instrument: 533	2025/26	Northern Ireland	PSNI[6]

This table sits above the detail sections below because it is the answer most readers want first. Each row links to the full context and caveats further down the page.

How many knife crimes are there in the UK per year?

There is no single official UK-wide knife crime figure. England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland each publish their own counts under different definitions. Police in England and Wales recorded 48,774 knife or sharp instrument offences (excluding homicide) in the year ending March 2026^[1]. Scotland recorded 11,249 crimes of handling an offensive weapon in 2024/25^[5]. Northern Ireland recorded 533 selected violent and sexual offences involving a knife or sharp instrument in 2025/26^[6].

These three totals measure different things and cannot be added together. The England and Wales figure covers a broad group of knife-enabled offences. The Scotland figure covers the specific crime of handling an offensive weapon, whether or not it was used in another offence. The Northern Ireland figure covers only a selected set of violent and sexual offence types where a knife or sharp instrument was recorded as involved. This is a narrower measure. Anyone quoting a “UK total” for knife crime is combining incompatible series.

Is knife crime rising or falling in England and Wales?

No. It is falling on the latest police recorded figures. Knife or sharp instrument offences fell 8% in the year ending March 2026, to 48,774, from 53,096 the year before^[1]. The Metropolitan Police Service recorded 28% of all these offences. West Midlands Police followed at 8%. Greater Manchester Police followed at 6%^[1].

Police recorded crime is not the same as the true level of crime in society. The Office for National Statistics states that police recorded crime is not a reliable long-term trend indicator on its own. Changes in police recording practices and priorities affect the count independently of whether more or fewer offences actually happened^[1]. A fall in the recorded figure can reflect less crime, less reporting, or a change in how a police force logs an offence. The Commons Library briefing on knife crime statistics makes the same point when comparing forces and years^[7].

How many people are killed with a knife each year?

205 people were victims of homicide by knife or sharp instrument in England and Wales in the year ending March 2025. That is a 21% fall from 261 the year before^[2]. This was the lowest number recorded since the year ending March 2015, when 186 such homicides were recorded^[2]. The fall was driven by fewer male victims, down from 206 to 150. The number of female victims stayed the same at 55^[2].

A kitchen knife was the specific weapon in 95 of these homicides in the year ending March 2025^[2]. Knives or sharp instruments were recorded in 9 of 19 homicides in Northern Ireland in 2025/26. That is 47%^[6]. These are separate national data series. The percentages are not directly comparable given the small numbers involved in Northern Ireland.

What percentage of knife crime involves children and teenagers?

Knife use is disproportionately linked to teenage homicide. Most knife crime overall does not involve a homicide at all though. Around two-thirds (65%) of teenage (13 to 19) homicide victims in England and Wales in the year ending March 2025 were killed with a knife or sharp instrument. That compares with 39% across all homicide victims of any age^[2]. The Commons Library separately reports that 16% of people admitted to hospital for assault by a sharp object in 2024/25 were aged 18 or under^[7].

Offenders aged 10 to 17 accounted for 3,324 of the 20,885 knife and offensive weapon disposals in the year ending March 2026. That is 15.9%^[3]. The remaining 84.1% of disposals were adults aged 18 and over^[3]. These are three different measures: homicide victims, hospital admissions and sentencing disposals. Each answers a different question about who is affected by or involved in knife crime.

How many knife possession disposals are there, and how many result in prison?

20,885 knife and offensive weapon offences were dealt with by the criminal justice system in England and Wales in the year ending March 2026^[3]. 30.9% of these resulted in an immediate custodial sentence. That is down from 33.4% the year before^[3]. The average custodial sentence length was 8.1 months across all offenders. It was 7.9 months for repeat offenders sentenced under the mandatory minimum provision in section 315 of the Sentencing Act 2020^[3].

A disposal is any outcome recorded by the courts. This includes a caution, a fine, a community order or a custodial sentence, not only convictions that end in prison. The custody rate answers a narrower question: of everyone dealt with for a knife or offensive weapon offence, what share went to immediate custody. Read the full penalty rules on knife crime penalties and sentencing for how these sentences are set in law.

How effective is stop and search against knife crime?

Stop and search for offensive weapons in England and Wales located a weapon in 12.3% of searches in the year ending March 2025. It led to an arrest in 17.7% of these searches^[4]. The number of these searches fell 8.7% compared with the year before^[4]. The Home Office notes that recorded finds likely undercount the true number. Data quality on what was found varies between police forces^[4].

A 12.3% find rate means that around 7 in 8 searches for an offensive weapon do not locate one. This does not by itself show whether stop and search reduces knife crime. The statistics record what a search found, not what would have happened without it. Anyone citing stop and search as proof of deterrence should note that the find rate and the crime rate are two separate measures.

How many people are admitted to hospital for a knife or sharp object assault?

3,337 people were admitted to NHS hospitals in England for assault by a sharp object in the year ending March 2026. That is a 5% fall from 3,523 the year before^[1]. This is a finished admission episode count from Hospital Episode Statistics. It records people admitted as inpatients, not everyone treated in an emergency department for a knife injury^[1]. A milder injury treated and discharged the same day without admission will not appear in this figure.

The Commons Library reports that 16% of these hospital admissions in 2024/25 were among people aged 18 or under^[7]. This is a clinical admissions count rather than a police record. It captures injuries regardless of whether the assault was reported to or recorded by the police. It can move independently of the police recorded crime figures above.

What is happening to knife crime in Scotland?

Scotland recorded 11,249 crimes of handling an offensive weapon in 2024/25^[5]. This splits into 6,744 crimes where the weapon was used in another offence (up 11% on the year before) and 4,505 crimes where it was not (down 5%)^[5]. Scotland’s recording rules changed in April 2017. Before then, handling an offensive weapon was treated only as an aggravating factor. From that point it started being counted as its own recorded crime alongside any other offence committed with it^[5]. Direct comparisons with pre-2017 Scottish figures are not reliable. The same applies to comparisons with the England and Wales knife-enabled offence count above. The two series measure different legal categories under different counting rules.

What is happening to knife crime in Northern Ireland?

Northern Ireland recorded 533 selected violent and sexual offences involving a knife or sharp instrument in 2025/26. That is close to the 530 recorded in 2024/25^[6]. This measure covers a defined group of offence types: homicide, attempted murder, threats to kill, actual and grievous bodily harm, robbery, and rape or sexual assault. It reports what share of each involved a knife or sharp instrument^[6]. A knife or sharp instrument was recorded in 3% of cases in 2025/26 across these offence types combined^[6].

PSNI separately recorded 1,360 possession of weapons offences in the year to March 2026. That is up 164 (13.7%) on the year before^[6]. This possession offence count is broader than the knife-specific measure above. It covers possession of any offensive weapon, not only knives. It is not restricted to the selected violent and sexual offence types in the previous paragraph.

Why do England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland figures not match up?

Each nation’s police force records crime against its own legal definitions and its own counting rules. The Home Office, the Scottish Government and the Department of Justice for Northern Ireland set these separately. England and Wales measures a broad “knife-enabled crime” category. Scotland measures the specific offence of handling an offensive weapon. Northern Ireland measures a selected set of violent and sexual offence types and reports what proportion involved a knife. None of these three counting bases match. Methodology also changes over time. Northern Ireland removed broken bottles and glass from its knife and sharp instrument definition, for example, to align more closely with England and Wales practice^[6]. Even a single nation’s own figures are not always comparable across years without checking the footnotes.

Police recorded crime also differs in kind from the Crime Survey for England and Wales. That survey asks a sample of the public about their experience of crime rather than counting police records. The ONS treats the survey as the better guide to long-term trends in crime overall. Police records give more detail on lower-volume, high-harm offences such as knife crime though. The survey does not measure these reliably, because too few respondents experience them^[1].

Where to read the law behind these figures

These statistics describe how often knives are involved in crime. They do not describe what the law says about carrying, selling or owning a knife.

Read UK knife law: what knives are legal in the UK for the legal test on carrying a knife. Read banned knives in the UK for the specific items that cannot be bought, sold or owned. If you are asking whether carrying a knife for protection is lawful, the direct answer is on the can you carry a pocket knife in the UK page: self-defence is not a good reason in law.

How to cite this page

When citing this page, add the date you accessed this page: My Knife Guide (2026). “UK Knife Crime Statistics.” https://myknifeguide.com/statistics/. Figures are drawn from the Office for National Statistics, the Ministry of Justice, the Home Office, the Scottish Government and the Police Service of Northern Ireland. Each is cited inline above with its own source link and checked date.

This page reports statistics. It is not advice about a specific situation. It does not tell you what the law allows you to carry. Use the support contacts above if you are worried about someone carrying a knife, or about being a victim of knife crime.