Experts say the decline is likely to return to more normal levels after unusual increases in previous years, warning that gun violence remains a major issue.
The United States could see its lowest number of mass killings in two decades in 2025, according to a database that tracks such incidents.
The Associated Press — which maintains the database along with USA TODAY and Northeastern University — reported Tuesday that a recent shooting at a family gathering in Stockton, California, that left four people dead, was the 17th mass killing this year.
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While that figure may have increased in December, it is a decline of nearly 59 percent from 2019, when there were a record 41 mass murders.
The database uses police and FBI reports, media articles and court records to track mass killings, which are defined as incidents in which four or more people were intentionally killed within a 24-hour period, with no perpetrators involved.
‘Regression to the mean’
James Alan Fox, a criminologist at Northeastern University who manages the database, told the AP that the tally for 2025 was about 24 percent lower than for 2024, which in turn was about 20 percent lower than for 2023.
He said the decline in numbers is likely a result of what statisticians call “regression to the mean,” which represents a return to more average crime levels after abnormal increases in previous years.
“Will 2026 see a decline?”. Fox said. “I wouldn’t bet on it.”
James Densley, a professor at Metropolitan State University in Minnesota, told the news agency that because the database tracked a rare event, the figures could be unstable.
“Since there are only a few dozen mass murders a year, a small change may seem like a wave or a decline,” he said, when it was actually a return to more typical levels.
“2025 looks really good in historical context, but we can’t pretend that means the problem is gone forever.”
Improve mass casualty responses
However, he said some factors may have contributed to the decline, including overall declines in homicides and violent crime, which peaked during the COVID-19 pandemic.
He said improvements in response to mass casualty incidents may also play a role.
He cited the August shooting during mass at a Minnesota school that killed two children and injured more than 20 — a crime that would not be recorded on the database because there were only two deaths.
“The only reason two people were killed was because of bleeding control and trauma response by first responders,” he said, adding that it was also helped by the fact that the shooting “took place on the doorstep of some of the best children’s hospitals in the country”.
Eric Madfis, a criminal justice professor at the University of Washington-Tacoma, told the AP that although gun violence and related deaths have declined in the US, “we still have a much higher rate and number of mass shootings than anywhere else in the world.”
Nearly 82 percent of mass murders in the US in 2025 involved firearms.
Since the database launched in 2006, 3,234 people have been killed in mass killings, 81 percent of them victims of shootings.
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