Victims of racial and religious hate crime
Published
1. Main facts and figures
- in the year ending March 2024, there were 140,561 hate crimes recorded by the police in England and Wales – down by 5% compared with the previous year (147,645)
- race hate crimes went down 5% from the previous year, from 103,625 to 98,799 offences
- religious hate crimes went up by 25%, from 8,370 to 10,484 offences
- 7 in 10 of all hate crimes were racially motivated
- across all police forces, 77,690 racially or religiously aggravated hate crimes were recorded in the year ending March 2024, and the ethnicity of the victims was known for 42,441 hate crimes
- 31.3% of victims of racially or religiously aggravated hate crime (where ethnicity was known) were Asian, 30.6% were White, and 23.1% were Black
- for comparison, White people made up 81.7% of the population of England and Wales at the 2021 Census – Asian people made up 9.3%, and Black people made up 4.0%
- the victim’s ethnicity was not known for 45.0% of racially or religiously aggravated offences
2. Things you need to know
What the data measures
The data shows the number and percentage of racially or religiously aggravated hate crimes, by the victim’s ethnicity.
Some offences have specific racially or religiously motivated elements defined by statute. These offences are distinct from their non-racially or religiously aggravated equivalents and are, by definition, considered to be hate crimes. Around a half (52%) of hate crime offences were recorded as one of these racially or religiously aggravated offences.
The hate crimes on this page include racially or religiously aggravated:
- assault without injury
- criminal damage
- harassment
- assault with injury
- public fear, alarm or distress
Percentages are rounded to one decimal place.
The ethnic groups used in the data
Data is shown for the following 5 ethnic groups:
- Asian
- Black
- Mixed
- White
- Other
The ethnicity of the victim is self-defined. The ethnicity of the victim was recorded in 55% of racially or religiously aggravated hate crimes.
Data is not comparable with the data for previous years because:
- it uses different ethnic group categories
- the method for identifying victims’ ethnicity is different
Methodology
Read the detailed methodology document for the data on this page.
Since 2014, police forces have changed how they:
- record crime
- identify what constitutes a hate crime
This means data on crime recorded by the police does not currently provide reliable trends in hate crime.
In the data file
Download the data for data on the number of racially or religiously aggravated hate crimes by police force area.
3. By ethnicity (racially or religiously aggravated offences only)
| Ethnicity | % | Number |
|---|---|---|
| Asian | 31.3 | 13,290 |
| Black | 23.1 | 9,799 |
| Mixed | 8.1 | 3,434 |
| White | 30.6 | 12,990 |
| Other | 6.9 | 2,928 |
Download table data for ‘By ethnicity (racially or religiously aggravated offences only)’ (CSV) Source data for ‘By ethnicity (racially or religiously aggravated offences only)’ (CSV)
4. Data sources
Source
Hate crime, England and Wales, Year ending March 2024
Type of data
Administrative data
Type of statistic
Official statistics
Publisher
Home Office
Publication frequency
Yearly
Purpose of data source
The data provides information on the number of hate crimes recorded by the police in England and Wales and a measure of the hate crime-related demand on the police.
5. Download the data
This file contains the following variables: Measure, Ethnicity, Ethnicity_type, Time, Time_type, Geography, Geography_type, Value, Value_type, Denominator, Count